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Copyright 1999, 2003 G. R. Morton
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A friend mentioned to me that I had been
discussed on Reasons to Believe's webcast show "Creation
Update". A caller, named Pete, phoned in to ask Ross about this web page.
The discussion is 1h 25 min. into the program which is at:
http://www.reasons.org/resources/mu.../cu20021022.ram
The ensuing discussion
with that friend, and Ross' claim that he valued my ability to find errors, caused
me to get the 2nd edition of The Genesis Question to see if he changed any
of the things I said were bad. Apparently, Ross' claim was mere fluff because
he didn't change anything in the 2nd edition, which
has been criticized on this web page. I wish I knew who the caller was. Anyway,
I have added (in red) the pages of these issues in the 2nd edition. Sadly, I must
conclude that Ross really doesn't accept criticism. Like a young-earther, he keeps
believing in spite of evidence to the contrary.
I am dropping back in for a brief visit. I won't be here long. I have finished reading Hugh Ross' new book _The Genesis Question_ (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 1998). Unfortunately, many of the claims made in this book have reinforced my severe suspicion of Christian apologists and their unwillingness to accurately cite modern research. What I have seen among the young-earth creationists, over and over, is selective use of the data, misrepresentation of the data and failure to cite important research. All of this applies to Ross' new book as much as it has in the past ICR products. Over the past few months, I truly have begun to wonder if Christian apologists can be trusted to get the scientific data correct. Reading this book last month and knowing of my interaction with Ross in 1996, sent me into an even more depressed state concerning the willingness of the apologists to face the data of modern science.
In this review, I will start with the biological issues then hit the geological issues before moving in part 2, to the area of my greatest disappointment, anthropology, and in particular the views on racial origins that are expressed. All quotations from Ross' book will merely be referenced with a page number. If the citation is from some other of Ross' writing, it will have a year with it. I apologize for the length. It could have been longer.
Biology
The most interesting item that came into focus during my reading of this book is the fact that Hugh Ross is a committed special creationist. By that I mean he holds the view that God created each species individually. He does not believe ANY significant morphological change occurs. I quote:
"Genesis offers this explanation: God created the first sea mammals on the fifth creation day. As the fossil record documents, sea mammals have persisted on Earth from that epoch until now, though not without interruption. Multiple extinctions of sea mammals imply that God repeatedly replaced extinct species with new ones. (See chapter eight for further discussion of this issue.) In most cases the new species were different from the previous ones because God was changing Earth's geology, biodeposits, and biology, step by step, in preparation for His ultimate creation on Earth---the human race. "The many 'transitional' forms of whales and horses suggest that God performed more than just a few creative acts here and there, letting natural evolution fill in the rest. Rather, God was involved and active in creating all the whale and horse species, the first, the last, and the 'transitional' forms." (p. 52 p. 53)
Being surprised by this, I went looking back through some of his other writings. One article says that dinosaur transitional forms were specially created by God in Ross (1998, p. 3).
This explains why Ross has occasionally written that the speciation rate is zero today. He writes:
"Research indicates that natural evolutionary processes, the observable microevolution, occurs at roughly the same rate today as it did before humans. Science offers no explanation, as yet, for the sudden change in the speciation rate, but the Bible offers one: the difference comes from the change in God's level of creative activity. Before Adam and Eve, it was high. After Adam and Eve, it dropped to zero."(p. 65 p. 65)
This claim of no speciation is so blatantly absurd that it would be laughable, if it were not being used to 'support the Bible. Here are some examples for Ross to consider:
"Hawaii harbors several moths of the genus Hedylepta that feed only on banana plants. Other species of the genus feed on other Hawaiian plants, and similarities of form demonstrate that one of these that feeds on palms is the ancestor of the banana- feeding species. Each of the banana-feeding species is restricted to high mountain forests on only one or two islands, and the reason they must bear a descendant rather than ancestral relationship to the palm-feeding species is that, while palm trees are native Hawaiian plants, banana trees are not. In fact Polynesians first introduced the banana plant to the Hawaiian Islands only about a thousand years ago. This sets an upper limit for the evolution of the new banana-feeding insect species. For all we know, they evolved in a small fraction of this interval." (Stanley, 1983, p. 21)
Prior to the voyages of exploration, rats did not live on the Island of Mauritius. Some of the rats, deserted the first ships that landed there. Today, the rats of Mauritius have a chromosome count and type that is unique. Nowhere else in the world do we find rats with this chromosomal arrangement. Yosida et al write:
"There are many researchers who have studied the chromosomes of the black rats from several locations of the world, but none has observed in them the karyotype characterized by the Robertsonian fission as seen in the Mauritius type." (T.H. Yosida, et al, 1979, p. 59)
This has arisen in the past 400 years and would prevent interbreeding.
Many, many examples of speciation by polyploidy could be cited by sophomores in Biology courses. Ross does allow for plant speciation, but claims "No plant species radically different from already existing species has arisen under human observation." (p. 42). This is falsified by cotton, (only cultivated cotton has lint-Sauer 1969,p.78), corn (which is huge by comparison with the ancestor and little looks like the earliest teosinte). Cox and Moore (1985, p. 221-222) write:
"Indeed, both maize and teosinte are now regarded as subspecies of Zea mays, but structurally they are very different, and in particular the evolution of the all important flower and fruit structure is still in dispute."
The claim that the speciation rate is zero or nearly zero today is clearly false. The claim that morphological change has not occurred is clearly false. Ross should not be advocating a view that is so easily falsified.
Origin of life
One of my personal disappointments with this book concerns Ross' claim:
"The simplest chemical step for the origin of life, the gathering of amino acids that are all left-handed and nucleotide sugars that are all right-handed (a phenomenon known as 'homochirality'), cannot be achieved under inorganic conditions." (p. 41 p. 39)
This is blatantly false and goes against the latest research. And it is a sad story of willfully ignoring the data. How do I know it is willful? Here is how. In September 1996, I was invited to a meeting here in Dallas with Hugh Ross. I went an hour early hoping to meet Ross and show him the Neanderthal flute which anthropologists had just discovered. This led to the exchange between Ross and I concerning the flute (Morton, 1996, Ross, 1997, p. 6-7).
At this meeting, I was seated at a table with three
friends, Ray Bohlin, co-author of The Natural Limits to Biological Change,
Jim McIntosh, Prof. of Anatomy at Baylor Dental School, and Daryl Wilson,
a Campus Crusade for Christ staffer. During the talk, Hugh made the claim
that he made above. During the question and answer session, I stood and
told Hugh that there were left-handed amino acids in the Murchison meteorite
and that unless he believed that there was life in outer space, there was
an inorganic process capable of manufacturing amino acids of the proper
handedness. He categorically denied that there was any evidence of the
sort. Considering that meteors are part of astronomy I was surprised by
this strong denial from him. I told him that there had been several articles
in Nature about the issue. He looked at the audience and once again denied
it. I sat down and looked at Ray, shaking my head. Ray was shaking his
also. After the meeting I talked to Tad, his staff member who was selling
books. (I forget his last name). Tad gave me his e-mail address. I told
Tad that I would send him the references for the articles and Tad assured
me that he would get them to Ross. Here is the e-mail I sent a blind copy
of this to Ray Bohlin so that he would be a witness to the sending of this
data (Besides, since Ray is anti-evolutionary, I wanted Ray to know that
the information exists) Here is my e-mail:
Thu Sep 12 22:10:37 1996
X-State: 3
X-Total-length: 1476 Bcc: raymond.bohlin@chrysalis.org
X-Mailer: GNNmessenger 1.3
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Date: Thu, 12 Sep 1996 22:10:37
From: GRMorton@gnn.com (Glenn Morton)
To: Tadd@Reasons.org
Subject: Non-biological L-form amino acids
Sir:
I am the guy who asked the question of Hugh about the left handed amino acids. Here is a reference to back up my statement that some type of non=biological process must exist to produce statistically significant left handed chirality. I told Hugh that night that it was 60-70%. I was wrong. it is 70-80%.
amino acid d/l ratio in Murchison meteorite
GLU ASP PRO LEU ALA
H2O
.322 .202 .342 .166 .682
H2O .30 .30 .30
nd .60
HCl .176 .126 .105 .029 .307
This proves non-biogenic hydrocarbons can be optically active ~Michael H. Engel and Bartholomew Nagy, "Distribution and Enantiomeric Composition of Amino Acids in the Murchison Meteorite", Nature , 296, April 29, 1982, p. 838.
and
This has been verified by further work in
Amino Acids extracted from Murchison meteorite are not racemic but actually have a higher L concentration. no quote ~M. H. Engel, S. A. Macko and J. A. Silfer, "Carbon Isotope Composition of Individual Amino Acids in the Murchison Meteorite", Nature, 348, November 1, 1990, p. 47-48.
Sincerely
glenn Foundation,Fall and Flood
http://members.gnn.com/GRMorton/dmd.htm
*************************************************
Tad did acknowledge receipt of this via e-mail and told me again that he would give it to Ross.
What is sad is that Hugh, instead of doing the scientifically honest thing, mentioning these articles and then attempting to explain why it won't work, still denies that this evidence exists. He KNOWS of this data because I personally told him of it face to face. I personally sent the references to his assistant who had assured me that he would get them to Ross. I find the failure to deal with the data every bit as selective as any young-earth creationist. And I find it disturbing. The study of meteors are part of astronomy which is Ross' expertise!
Since that time, even more work has confirmed the left-handed nature of amino acids from the Murchison meteor. See Petersen 1997, p.118; Cronin and Pizzarello, 1997, p. 951; Engel and Macko, 1997, p.265-268; Chyba, 1997, p. 234-235; Bailey et al, 1998; Irion, 1998; and so I won't be charged with selectivity, here is a contra view Pizzarello and Cronin, 1998.
I might cite Petersen's article, which is from the popular press and is easily obtainable and thus should have been picked up by Ross' research team. Petersen writes:
"'This is the first convincing demonstration that there may be some natural, nonbiological process that results in a slight. . .excess of the [left-handed] amino acids.', says Jeffrey L. Bada of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif." (Petersen, 1997, p. 118 [ellipses are Petersen's not mine])
While Ross might have ignored the articles I sent him in 1996, he should not continue to ignore the voluminous literature on this issue. That is what I expect from a young-earth creationist. I find it odd that Ross chides the young-earth creationists for "misguiding many whose science education and biblical training are inadequate to aid them in evaluation." (Ross, 1991, p. 155) and chides them for their 'denial of physical reality' (Ross 1994, p. 123) yet he appears to be doing the same.
Lest someone criticize me for criticizing Ross without going to him directly, as noted above, I did. It had no more effect than when, in 1980, I tried to tell Henry Morris that there were errors in Dillow's surface temperature calculations of a vapor canopy earth. (And I might note that this web page had no effect on the 2nd edition either) (see Dillow 1983, p. 13,14 note 36 for Dillow's admission that I had been correct). Too many Christian apologists don't seem to want to listen to anything that challenges their viewpoint.
Geology
It is quite clear that Ross did not have a geologist review this book prior to publication. The book was reviewed by only two "research scientists Sam Conner and David Rogstad, and theologians Craig Keener, Mick Ukleja, and John Rea,… (p. 7)" Last month I e-mailed Reasons to Believe asking what were the areas of expertise possessed by Conner and Rogstad. I got no reply until 1/4/98. Conner is an astronomer; Rogstad works at JPL. From the looks of this book, Rogstad is unlikely to be a geologist. Hugh starts with the claim (p. 11 p. 9) that the sequence of events in the Genesis account matches the established scientific record on 'more than a dozen' counts. One should ask a paleontologist if this is the case. While Ross can declare victory/conformance with the scientific record, it doesn't make it so. There are several areas that don't seem to fit the scientific record. One criticism is that whales should have been created with the birds and fish on day 5. The Hebrew uses the word "tanniyn" which is the Hebrew word for whale. And there is no doubting that the Hebrew intended us to believe that birds ('owph) are created with the fish. Yet no fossil whales are found with the earliest birds or fish. And no birds are found with the earliest fish. In fact the scientific record shows that fish lived about 500 million years ago, prior to the birds(Sansom 1996, p. 628) and the birds lived about 150 million years ago, prior to the whales who are first found in rocks dated 53-54 million years ago (Baipai and Gingerich, 1998,p. 15464-15468). In what way can this be said to match the sequence of the Genesis account? And what is bizarre, Ross makes the following statement as if this solves the issue:
"Recent discoveries reveal that the first sea mammals date much earlier than paleontologists had once thought. Fossils of four extinct species of whales-Pakicetus, Nalacetus, Ambulocetus, and Indocetus-have been dated at 52 million, 52 million, 50 million, and 48 million years ago, respectively. These dates eliminate any credible challenge to the placement of the first sea mammals on the fifth creation day." P. 50 p. 50
The dates are precisely the problem with fitting whales into the fifth day and Ross merely cites the dates as if they solve the problem that the dates initially created.
In other areas of geology his book is equally bad. The book claims that the Mesopotamian alluvium is lower in radioactivity than other areas and this is why Adam and his immediate descendants lived longer. On page 118 p. 120-121 it says that isolation from radioactivity would allow preflood peoples to live longer [i.e. 900 years] and on p. 156 p. 160 says that they had to live in Mesopotamia. This implies that Mesopotamia must be low in radioactivity. This violates two things. One, Tigris and Euphrates sediment is as radioactive as any other sediment coming off an igneous terrane, like that of Turkey. Iraq is a producer of indigenous uranium (http://www.uic.com.au/nip15.htm) and thus is not a radiation free zone. Two, there is no way that radioactivity could be excluded from sedimentary rocks. We will return to this issue of longevity.
While I am not a fan of the global flood model, he presents a terrible argument against the global flood. He claims that if there was a global flood the earth's core would ring for tens of thousands of years. (p. 149 p. 154 He removes the explicit statement but leaves the reference which is still being used wrong) As a geophysicist I find this to be utter and irredeemable poppycock. The cited articles say nothing of the sort. The cited articles are speaking of atmospherically induced seismic sound. The continued input of atmospheric energy maintains the ring. But this ringing is of such a low amplitude that it has only just now been detected. And besides sound cannot propagate for tens of thousands of years. Has Ross, who surely took physics, never heard of friction? In sound waves in the earth (a field in which I earn my living) there are several sources of frictional energy loss. There is Q which is a frequency based loss, there is dispersion, diffraction, absorption, heat generation, all of which diminish the seismic wave's amplitude. Reflection of sound waves at every acoustical boundary removes energy from the traveling wave. If Ross were correct, then every earthquake would lead to endless 'ringing' in the earth's core, but in fact after about 20 hours, most of the energy created in an earthquake has been expended and geophones fall very silent. This is one of the silliest arguments I have ever heard against a global flood. Maybe this is because I know this area so well, but never the less, if we are going to criticize the global flood, for Pete's sake let's use better arguments than this.
In defense of his Mesopotamian flood he claims that there would be no evidence left by even a 1-year-long, 300-foot-deep flood occurring there. (p. 155 p. 159) This is false. Every rock we have in geology is the record of a previous geologic event, be it slow or catastrophic deposition. These records in rock go back millions of years in some cases. In the scenario outlined by Ross for a 300 foot deep flood occurring in Mesopotamia there are several observational expectations which are not satisfied. There would be raised beaches which would have been cut by the waves, there would be a widespread Holocene/late Pleistocene clastic layer. The USGS open-file report 97-470B shows a very limited Holocene deposit. There are NO Holocene deposits along the shore just south of Kuwait. If there had been a 300 foot deep flood it should be there. There should be coarse gravel and sand deposits with giant ripples-there isn't.
This view also violates physics (a second, IMO inexcusable, violation from a person who has studied physics!). A 300 foot tall wall of water simply can't stand for a year in the Mesopotamian basin. The southern end of the Persian basin is open to sea-level and the water would rush downhill rapidly and be emptied into the Indian Ocean in much less than a year. If he wants this to be miraculous he should say so. But he doesn't so it is fair to criticize him on the laws of fluid flow.
It is also fair to criticize the inconsistency between the 300 ft flood discussed on p. 155 p. 159 while in order to get the ark to land on what he calls 'the Mountains of Ararat' he presents a map with a 600 foot contour as the depth of the flood (p. 147 and Fig. 19.1 p. 166 p. 170). How the ark climbs the extra 300 feet elevation without any water is a real mystery.
He claims that the flood sediments would be eroded away over the past few thousand years. Ross writes:
"The assumption that clear evidence 'should' remain must be challenged. The Flood, though massive, lasted but one year and ten days. A flood of such brief duration typically does not leave a deposit substantial enough to be positively identified thousands of years later." p. 155 p. 159
This is false as there are sedimentary rocks from the Cretaceous (>65 myr) to be found in western Iraq. He also misses the fact that there are loads and loads of floods from that time frame that HAVE left lots of evidence for themselves even over the past 18-20,000 years. AND WE CAN IDENTIFY THESE SEDIMENTS EVEN AFTER 18,000 YEARS!
"Immense terranes of coarse gravel and sand over 30 meters high line the upper Columbia River valley in western Canada, attesting to staggering volumes of meltwater flowing through river valleys to the Pacific. Large lakes formed at least five times in the northern Rocky Mountains. In western Montana, a large basin filled several times to form Lake Missoula which was as much as 300 meters deep. This lake drained several times as glaciers to the northeast enlarged and then shrank. The most spectacular draining occurred about 18,000 years ago, when its ice-moraine dam in northern Idaho broke. Water rushed across eastern Washington with incredible velocity. This gigantic flood scoured channels and deposited immense gravel ripples 10 meters high over a large part of the Columbia Plateau, now called channeled scablands because of the peculiar topography left by the flood." (Dott and Batten, 1988, p. 582)
Ross is wrong about how long evidence can last in the geologic record. We can identify this event after 18,000 years. Even a massive 300 foot deep flood as advocated by Ross, should have left similar types of deposits. There are none in Mesopotamia. His claim that the evidence would be easily lost is ad hoc, designed to avoid the impact of the obvious lack of observable data supporting his view.
One other example:
"Pleistocene glacial outburst floods were released from ice-dammed lakes of the Altay Mountains, south-central Siberia. The Kuray-Chuja lake system yielded peak floods in excess of 1 x 10^6 m^3 s^-1 and as great as 18 x 10^6 m^3 s^-1. The phenomenally high bed shear stresses and stream powers generated in these flows produced a main-channel, coarse-grained facies of coarse gravel in (1) foreset-bedded bars as much as 200 m high and several kilometers long, and (2) degradational, boulder-capped river terraces. Giant current ripples, 50 to 150 m in spacing, composed of pebble and cobble gravel, are locally abundant. The whole sedimentary assemblage is very similar to that of the Channeled Scabland, produced by the Pleistocene Missoula Floods of western North America." (Rudoy and Baker, 1993, p. 53)
If there had been a 300 foot deep flood in Mesopotamia the evidence would be more than abundantly there.
He claims (p. 154 p. 159) that North America's plains emerged from under water more than 200 million years ago. NOT SO! Much of Texas has emerged from the ocean only within the past 30 myr and most of the Midcontinent emerged after the Cretaceous period (<65 MYR old).(see paleogeographic maps in Dott and Batten, 1988) p. 484-485 and p. 528-529)
He claims that rain as we know it never falls in Mesopotamia! On page 147-148 p. 152 he says:
"Certain well-timed geologic events could bring all that water to the surface. And while rain as we know it virtually never falls in Mesopotamia, an 'act of God' could certainly bring it to the region and sustain the 40-day torrent which Genesis records."
The 'fact' that rain as we know it doesn't fall in Iraq, will be news to the weathermen in Baghdad maybe even to weathermen in the Pentagon.
He does not tell exactly what geologic processes will cause water to come out of the rocks at all. I will tell you that permeability and porosity of most aquifers limits the flow rates of water out of them, even in an artesian situation. I have never seen or heard of any geologic event cause water to spurt out of the rocks AND THEN FLOOD A REGION. It is just silly.
Anthropology
This is the area that most disappoints me. Ross claims that human history begins with mankind's special creation 'less than a hundred thousand years ago' (p. 110 p. 110). This is a significant change for Ross as he has consistently claimed that if man was created prior to 60,000 years ago the bible would be wrong (Ross, 1995,p. 2). I applaud any more ancient movement of the appropriate time for Adam's creation.
As noted above, Ross believes that the lack of radioactivity is what allowed early man to live 900 years. This should mean that the modern Iraqis should have a significantly longer life span than other peoples not so fortunate to live in Mesopotamia. Of course this isn't true. But Hugh has an explanation. It seems that 18,000 years ago, the Vela supernova exploded 1300 lyr away from the earth and irradiated our ancestors causing their life spans to decrease (p. 119-120 p. 121-123). He claims that this is the nearest supernova that has occurred in human history (unfortunately he is wrong). He suggests an experiment to test this idea by raising a child in a totally radiation free environment. But such a test is not really necessary to know that such a view of human longevity is erroneous (although something similar has been done-see below). If it were true, then those people who live in Denver, with less of an atmospheric blanket protecting them from radiation should have significantly shorter life spans than those living at sea level. They don't. Secondly since his book went to press a new discovery has falsified Ross' view that the Vela pulsar is the nearest and most powerful human era supernova and it has falsified the view that life span is related to supernovae. Why do we not see a second reduction in life span with the supernova RXJ0852.0-4622 which is 600 lyr away and whose light (and supposedly life span reducing cosmic rays) struck the earth 700 years ago. Vela is 1630 lyr away and supposedly caused great reduction in life span..(Aschenbach, 1998, p. 141; Iyudin, 1998, p. 142)
Cowen writes:
"Appearing low in the sky across central Europe and Asia, the stellar explosion may have shone as brightly as Venus and could have been visible for a month. "No one knows for sure, since astronomers have no eyewitness account of this celestial event. But two teams of researchers, who have now discovered the remnant of this previously unknown explosion, say it's the closest supernova to have graced terrestrial skies during the past 1,500 years. Indeed, evidence suggests that the remnant resides a mere 600 light-years from Earth and that the stellar explosion from which it arose appeared in the southern sky only about 700 years ago."(Cowen, 1998 p. 309)
Surely our life spans should have been shortened by this event if the Vela supernova did a job on our ancestors! But we didn't see a second reduction in the middle 1200s. The fact that our lives today are longer than those of 600 years ago falsifies Ross' suggestion.
Ross, in his belief that radioactivity is the cause of shortened life spans, suggests that if we could rear people in radiation free environments we would see a significant lengthening of life (p. 120 p. 123). Apparently similar experiments have been performed. Eighteen years ago, the young-earth creationist, Dillow presented evidence to contradict Ross' idea. Dillow acknowledges that radiation can't have an effect on life span. And Ross could have learned of this if he had wanted to. Dillow writes:
"Experiments have been conducted in which mice were placed hundreds of feet below the ground to shield them from all cosmic radiation. There was no indication of an increase in longevity in either the parents or their offspring." (Dillow 1981, p. 170; Dillow cites personal communication with Dr. Johan Bjorksten)
It would appear that some of what Ross has suggested has already been done with results that falsify his thesis.
Who is human?
I have criticized Ross' views on Neanderthal and H. erectus many times in the past (see Fall 1996 Evolution Reflector archives). He considers them to be nothing more than bipedal mammals. The new twist in this book is that Ross tells us why he created these bipedal mammals. It seems that God created these beings to prepare the animal world for the coming shock of spiritual man.( p. 56-57 p. p. 56). What scriptural support one could advance in support of such a hypothesis I really wouldn't know. Ross offers no rational for having read God's mind in this regard.
As I have noted elsewhere, the idea that there were mammals that looked like us who were not spiritual raises the question 'Do any of these non-spiritual mammalian bipeds still live today?' In light of Ross' treatment of Babel (see below) this question becomes more important. Ross claims that all human cultures have engaged in religion. Ross (p. 110 p. 110) writes:
"All known human societies, wherever and whenever they have existed, however, large or small, technologically sophisticated or not, have engaged in religious worship involving temples, altars, icons, and other unique relics."
But this is not so. While many, many Christians have made this claim few have actually gone to the trouble to verify this claim. Lucas Bridges, the son of the first missionary to the Tierra del Fuegan Indians, lived with them for years and years even after his father died. His book is an anthropological masterpiece on first contact between two cultures. To understand the following quote, one must realize that Klokten were novices in the men's lodge of the Ona--Initiates who had passed their first exam-an a Joon is the Ona word for magician, not God. Bridges writes:
"I have met white men who told strange stories of Tierra del Fuego, and, as far as I could judge, believed in what they told. One claimed to have found a mysterious spot in the Forest, where there was a great stone on which human sacrifices had recently been made. Another spoke of a cave where young guanaco, fat birds and other luxuries were deposited as gifts to the gods, later to be devoured, no doubt, by some cunning medicine-man or priest. I heard one lecturer solemnly telling his audience: 'They believe in a god called klokten' Imagine anyone giving a talk on the Navy, and announcing: "They believe in a god called Midshipman.' "According to other so-called explorers, the Ona also worshiped Hyewhi, which means a song or chant, and joon, which has occurred too often in these pages to need translation here. One authority went so far as to prove, to his own satisfaction, that Joon, is directly derived from the Hebrew Jehovah." "These stories demonstrate how a vivid imagination, combined with wishful thinking and the desire to impart interesting information, may influence a certain type of otherwise enlightened and educated men. "During the many hours I passed in the Lodge, listening to the exhortations of the older men, and during the years I spent almost exclusively in the company of the Ona Indians, I never heard a word that pointed to religion or worship of any kind; no expectation or hope of reward--no fear of punishment--in a future life. There was dread of death by witchcraft and a lesser dread of the ghosts of the woods, but not the ghosts of the departed dead. Respect there was for individual mountains such as Heuhupen, who, annoyed at being rudely pointed at, might wrap herself in clouds and bring on bad weather. Fear of death, end of life, may have existed; possibly some unexpressed terror of the unknown; but there was no worship, no prayer, no god, no devil." ( Bridges 1949, p. 429)
The Ona also had no marriage ceremony. A man merely took a woman into his hut. What saddens me is that the claim that there were bipedal mammals that look like us that are not spiritual, could cause some to look at the Ona and claim that they are the representatives of those bipedal, spiritless beings of which Ross writes. But unfortunately Christians will continue to believe that all cultures had worship even in the face of the evidence that it isn't true.
Concerning who is human and who isn't Ross writes:
"From a biblical perspective, painting, musical ability, burial of the dead, and use of tools could represent evidence of soulishness, not spirituality. Birds and primates, even elephants, have been observed to engage in such activities, which reflect mind and emotion, not spirit. "Although bipedal, tool-using, large-brained primates roamed Earth for hundreds of thousands (perhaps a million) years, religious relics date back only about eight thousand to twenty-four thousand years. Thus, the anthropological date for the first spirit creatures agrees with the biblical date. (For further discussion on this issue, see chapter fourteen.) "Though most anthropologists still insist that the bipedal primates were 'human,' the conflict lies more in semantics than in research data. Support for their views that modern humans descended from these primate species is rapidly eroding. Evidence now indicates that all bipedal primates went extinct, with the possible exception of Neandertal, before the advent of human beings. As for Neandertal, the possibility of a biological link with humanity has been conclusively ruled out." (p. 55 p. 56)
Almost everything in this passage is erroneous. There is no evidence of any animal digging holes in the ground and burying their dead. Birds and primates certainly don't do it, Elephants, which Ross has cited elsewhere as engaging in burial behavior (Ross, 1991, p. 159-160) is simply a misreading of the data on elephants. Elephants OCCASIONALLY will throw leaves, branches etc on their dead, they also do it for humans they have just killed, and rhinocerii. (Douglas-Hamilton and Douglas-Hamilton, 1975, p. 237-238). Neither birds, primates nor elephants have been reported to manufacture a musical instrument for the purpose of making music. The oldest flute is from Libya and dates at least 80 kyr (Isaac, 1989, p. 71) and the oldest bone whistle of the kind that was made by Europeans into the last century dates at least 100 kyr (Stpanchuck 1993).
Recent discoveries have revived the debate about how old religion is. It certainly appears to be much older than 24,000 years. Ross continues to rely on a very outdated Science News articles to support his thesis (Simon, 1981, p. 357; Bower, 1986, p. 378-379; Ross, 1991, p. 160 and p. 213 note 29). Surely one should be expected to at least look at more recent data. Data that has come to light since (and some that existed before) then shows that Ross' claim is erroneous.
There was apparently an altar in Chauvet Cave(dated 31,000 years ago[Balter, 1996, p. 449). A bear skull was precariously placed on a flat topped stone and fire was burned just behind the skull. Chauvet et al, write:
"A little further on we were deeply impressed by what we discovered. In the middle of the chamber, on a block of grey stone of regular shape that had fallen from the ceiling, the skull of a bear was placed as if on an altar. The animal's fangs projected beyond it into the air. On top of the stone there were still pieces of charcoal, the remains of a fireplace. All around, on the floor, there were more than thirty bear skulls; now covered in a frosting of amber-coloured calcite, they were purposely set out on the earth. There were no traces of skeletons. This intentional arrangement troubled us because of its solemn peculiarity." (Chauvet et al, 1996, p. 50)
The lack of bear skeletal parts proves that these were not stray bears that got trapped and died in the cave. Their heads were removed elsewhere and brought into the cave.
The fact that 30,000 years ago man was apparently worshipping the bear lends credence to the next oldest probable religious site. Except this one was built by Neanderthal. At Bruniquel, France, archeologists have excavated a square stone structure dating to more than 47,000 years ago (prior to the advent of modern man in Europe) in which the Neanderthals burned a bear. Bednarik (1996, p. 104) writes:
"The cave of Bruniquel in southern France has just produced fascinating new evidence. Several hundred metres in from the cave entrance, a stone structure has been discovered. It is quadrilineal, measures four by five metres and has been constructed from pieces of stalagmite and stalactite. A burnt fragment of a bear bone found in it was radiocarbon analysed, yielding a 'date' of greater than 47 600 years BP. This suggests that the structure is the work of Neanderthals. It is located in complete darkness, which proves that the people who ventured so deep into the large cave system had reliable lighting and had the confidence to explore such depths. Bruniquel is one of several French caves that became closed subsequent to their Pleistocene use, but were artificially opened this century."
This appears to have been the ritual sacrifice of a bear. It is also the first proof that man went deep into caves long before they painted the walls. (Balter, 1996, p. 449)
Neanderthals at Nahr Ibrahim, Lebanon, appear to have ritually sacrificed a deer. Marshack writes:
"In the Mousterian cave shelter of Nahr Ibrahim in Lebanon the bones of a fallow deer (Dama mesopotamia) were gathered in a pile and topped by the skull cap. Many of the bones were unbroken and still articulated. Around the animal were bits of red ochre. While red ochre was common in the area and so may have been introduced inadvertently, the arrangement of the largely unbroken bones suggests a ritual use of parts of the animal." (Marschack 1990, p. 481)
The ochre was proven to have been brought in from elsewhere by the discoverer (Solecki, 1982). This site is greater than 40,000 years old.
The 80,000 year old site of Drachenloch, Switzerland, also appears to have been a religious site, once again a Neanderthal site. Bachler found what appeared to be ritually arranged cave bear bones and ashes on what he called a sacrificial altar. (Lissner, 1961, 187-188). Campbell and Loy write:
"The most famous example of what has been claimed to be Neandertal hunting magic is the so-called bear cult. It came to light when a German archaeologist, Emil Bachler, excavated the cave of Drachenloch between 1917 and 1923. Located 8,000 ft (2,400 m) up in the Swiss Alps, this 'lair of the dragons' tunnels deep into a mountainside. The front part of the cave, Bachler's work made clear, served as an occasional dwelling place for Neandertals. Farther back, Bachler found a cubical chest made of stones and measuring approximately 3.25 ft (1 m) on a side. The top of the chest was covered by a massive slab of stone. Inside were seven bear skulls, all apparently arranged with their muzzles facing the cave entrance. Still deeper in the cave were six bear skulls, seemingly set in niches along the walls. The Drachenloch find is not unique. At Regourdou in southern France, a rectangular pit, covered by a flat stone weighing nearly a ton, held the bones of more than 20 bears." (Campbell and Loy, 1996, p. 441)
Honesty demands that one note that Drachenloch (not Regourdou) is controversial so for an alternative view, see Kurten (1976, p. 84-86) For a discussion of why I don't think Kurten's critique is correct see Morton (1997, p.73-75)
There is an even earlier altar, which is not controversial, found at Bilzingsleben, Germany. The excavators, Dietrich and Ursula Mania have found a 27-foot-diameter paved area that they say was used for "special cultural activities" (Mania et al,1994, p. 124; See also Mania and Mania, 1988, p. 92). Gore writes:
"But Mania's most intriguing find lies under a protective shed. As he opens the door sunlight illuminates a cluster of smooth stones and pieces of bone that he believes were arranged by humans to pave a 27-foot-wide circle. "'They intentionally paved this area for cultural activities,' says Mania. 'We found here a large anvil of quartzite set between the horns of a huge bison, near it were fractured human skulls.'" (1997,p. 110)
I would contend that the symbolism here, if found in a modern village, would be enough to cause one to turn and flee for his life. Such an arrangement of objects would immediately be interpreted as evidence of religion, and a hostile religion at that. And Bilzingsleben dates to around 400,000 years, not the mere 24,000 years that Ross prefers for the oldest evidence of religion. If Ross wishes to claim that religion doesn't go back further than 24,000 years, he should explain why the above five examples don't qualify as examples of religion? It is clear that evidence of religion in the anthropological record prior to 24,000 years is not rare. Ross can't prove his case by ignoring these sites and this data.
Probably the most damning thing I can say about the book is that Ross selectively cites data that supports his views . He cites the date for the last common male ancestor of between 35,000 to 47,000 BC (p. 111) which comes from Whitfield et al, (1995) without mentioning that the immediately preceeding article, by Hammer, (1995) reaches a conclusion from another part of the Y-Chromosome that the last common ancestor lived 188,000 years ago with 68% confidence . He calls Whitfield's article a breakthrough even though it only studied the y-chromosome of 5 individual humans. Why isn't Hammer's article, published by Nature's editor at the same time, also a breakthrough? Hammer studied 15 humans. Ross cites Whitfield because Whitfield supports his preconceived idea. Ross doesn't cite Hammer's numbers because it doesn't fit those preconceptions. He should have, at the very least, acknowledged that there was contradictory data with a contradictory age for the presumed time of Adam.
Ross totally misrepresents the data from Schwartz and Tattersall(1996). Ross writes:
"The nasal bones and sinus cavities of Neandertals are so large and so distinct that Schwartz and Tattersall go on to conclude that Neandertals cannot be biologically related to any known primate species or any known mammalian species." (p. 113 p. 113; see also top p. 114 p. 114)
This is totally false as can be seen from the following quotation from the referenced article. They do not say that Neanderthals are unrelated to mammals. Indeed Neanderthals ARE mammals as are we. Schwartz and Tattersall write (1996, p. 10852):
"The purpose of this contribution is to describe specializations of the Neanderthal internal nasal region that make them unique not only among hominids but possibly among terrestrial mammals in general as well."
It is their NOSE that is unique, not their phylogeny.
They further write (Schwartz and Tattersall 1996, p. 10854): "This observation alone does not necessarily demonstrate that Neanderthals constitute a species separate from Homo sapiens, but it is very strongly consistent with this conclusion."
If Neanderthal is unrelated to mammals, then there can be no discussion of whether or not he is a separate species from Homo sapiens. He would be in a different Class, not merely a different species. This betrays a tremendous lack of understanding of biology.
He further misrepresents the conclusion of Krings et al (1997) in their mtDNA work on Neanderthal. Ross (p. 114 p.115 similar statement) claims that "The researchers considered these findings conclusive: Neanderthals could not have made any contribution to the human gene pool."
This is NOT what the researchers claim, although such claims were made in the popular press. Here is what the researchers actually said (Krings et al, 1997, p. 27):
"These results do not rule out the possibility that Neandertals contributed other genes to modern humans. However, the view that Neandertals would have contributed little or nothing to the modern human gene pool is gaining support from studies of molecular genetic variation at nuclear loci in humans."
This hardly sounds 'conclusive' that there is no contribution of Neandertals to modern men. It may be that there was no contribution, but this is not the 'conclusive' article that Ross claims it is. This work has not addressed the nuclear DNA issue at all.
Finally, I think the scariest thing about the book is the treatment of race. Having grown up in the south, remembering 'colored only water fountains' and the racial separation of 40 years ago, Ross' treatment of the Tower of Babel is frightening. (Honesty demands that I alert the reader here that my middle son [who is and looks Arabic] was questioned for 30 minutes this Christmastime in London's Gatwick Airport BECAUSE he looks Arabic and the Iraqi bombing was going on. The idea that this kid could be a terrorist is laughable. But he caught this treatment because of his looks. Obviously this has heightened my sensitivities here. But they should have been heightened anyway.) Ross writes (p. 177-178 p. 181-182):
"Given that Genesis 11 so explicitly describes God's personal intervention in breaking up destructive unity and in motivating people to spread throughout Earth's habitable land masses, God may have done more than diversify language at that time. He possibly may have introduced also some external changes-those we recognize as racial distinctives-to facilitate the peoples' separation."
Without a doubt, Ross did not intend this badly nor would he want this view used in a bad way. But one might legitimately wonder if God was the author of racial hatred. If this view becomes standard Christian dogma, it WILL be used badly. Anyone who doubts this is a hopeless optimist. There are those today who will use this to claim that God did not intend for the races to mix. The fact is that many modern Christians, not Ross, are now beginning to accept the idea that Adam was the progenitor of only part of the human race (Fischer,1996), the combination of the two concepts would be very bad for racial relations. I wonder if anybody at NavPress bothered to ask the African American community what they might think about such a statement? Ross should have had the good sense not to write it and the editors at NavPress should have had the good judgment to talk Ross out of it and failing that, to edit this dangerous statement. Unfortunately, they didn't.
Conclusion
I am sure that many, even my friends, will chide me for being so 'critical' of a fellow believer. Frankly, I don't care anymore what others might think. Truth must win out. We Christians are the ones suppressing the truth in unrighteousness. As long as we do that we can't glorify God. One prays for the time when Christian apologists will not twist or deny the existence of data in order to fit their preferred theology. Given Ross' stature, this book will have a major impact and will be an economic success for its publisher. Unfortunately, the science is less of a success and the views on why racial characteristics were given to men is down right scary.
An overriding concern in my intellectual journey now happens to be whether Christian testimony, is worth anything - including early Christian testimony. This book has seriously eroded my expectations of Christian apologetics and apologists. It has depressed me further. If Christians can't be trusted to get their research correct, of what value is their apologetics? Can apologetics be effective if the data is silly and just plain wrong? Is this the quality of work that will prevent the scientifically minded among us from leaving the faith? Are Christians in apologetics to be trusted? Unfortunately the apparent answer to the last question is decidedly no. We appear to be no better than the Russians in the old disarmament talks. To quote Reagan, "Trust, but verify"
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