{"id":3894,"date":"2015-10-10T21:05:30","date_gmt":"2015-10-11T01:05:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/?p=3894"},"modified":"2017-05-17T16:14:52","modified_gmt":"2017-05-17T20:14:52","slug":"my-claims-re-piltdown-man-the-scopes-trial-twisted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2015\/10\/my-claims-re-piltdown-man-the-scopes-trial-twisted.html","title":{"rendered":"My Claims Regarding Piltdown Man &#038; the Scopes Trial Twisted"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/572\/2015\/10\/OsbornHF.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-3895 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/572\/2015\/10\/OsbornHF.jpg\" alt=\"OsbornHF\" width=\"492\" height=\"688\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Henry Fairfield Osborn (1857-1935) in 1919: sadly mistaken Nebraska Man and Piltdown Man enthusiast<\/span> [public domain \/ <a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:H._F._Osborn.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Wikimedia Commons<\/a>]<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">* * * * *<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/stonesnbones.blogspot.com\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Dr. Gary S. Hurd\u00a0<\/a>received a doctorate in Social Science (emphasis in Anthropology) from the University of California, Irvine in 1976. For the next 10 years he\u00a0was a medical researcher and professor of psychiatry leaving the Medical College of Georgia in 1985. He\u00a0held numerous adjunct appointments and returned full-time to archaeology, his first interest. He has\u00a0received honors for teaching and research and has involved dozens of undergraduate students in published research.<\/p>\n<p>There are a lot of similarities here, of interests. I majored in sociology, minored in psychology, and love archaeology (especially biblical archaeology).<\/p>\n<p>He came after me (or I should say, after windmills), guns blazing, in the combox of my post, <span style=\"color: #141823;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2015\/10\/simultaneously-dumb-smart-christians-atheists-scientists.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\">Simultaneously\u00a0Dumb\u00a0&amp;\u00a0Smart\u00a0Christians,\u00a0Atheists,\u00a0&amp;\u00a0Scientists<\/a>, which was devoted to showing how very intelligent people can make the dumbest of mistakes. Ironically and humorously, in attacking me on thoroughly erroneous, non-factual grounds, he provides a classic, textbook example of precisely the thing I was trying to illustrate in my paper, and in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2015\/10\/atheist-premise-driven-misunderstandings-of-theistic-arguments.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\">related follow-up post<\/a>, which was also a reply to three wrongheaded critiques of my arguments in the post above.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The common theme in all the misguided \u201ccritiques\u201d coming my way is atheists or agnostics mistakenly portraying\u00a0a Christian (in this case, me) as basically ignorant with regard to the fundamental nature of science. If a person keeps <em>underestimating<\/em> his dialogical opponent, he will make a fool of himself every time, especially if his opponent happens to be one (like me) who has engaged in serious socratic dialogue for 34 years, and is well-versed in it. In other words, he picked the wrong person to misrepresent.<\/p>\n<p>The mistakes Dr. Hurd made here are very basic ones, and there is no excuse for them. He says I maintained things that I never did. He pulled \u2019em out of thin air. But these things arise out of an undue emotional hostility, which I analyzed (as a general trait of human nature) in my <a href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2015\/10\/atheist-premise-driven-misunderstandings-of-theistic-arguments.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\">previous post<\/a>. I know from whence they come. But that doesn\u2019t make misrepresentation right. <span style=\"color: #141823;\">I gave Dr. Hurd a chance to save face before I posted this. He had several hours to remove his post. I wrote in the combox:<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><span style=\"color: #141823;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Are you <em>serious<\/em>? I\u2019m gonna have a field day with this one . . . As usual, my actual view has been grotesquely distorted and misrepresented. Basic reading skills and comprehension seem to be lacking here (perhaps you were drunk while writing this tripe?) . . . In charity, I\u2019ll give you some time to take this down, so as not to be embarrassed by my reply. But something tells me you won\u2019t do that.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #141823;\">His reply was: <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Bwaahahahaha. What a silly man.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>He was forewarned. His words will be in <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">blue<\/span>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">This essay by Mr. Armstrong is remarkable for his diverse errors. <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Well, we\u2019ll see if he can <em>back up<\/em> his ambitious claims, won\u2019t we?<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">These are scientific, historical, and medical. <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Oh, goodie; all <em>three<\/em>, huh?<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">I thought that rather than just list them, I would address them singly. <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">How thoughtful of you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Of course, Mr. Armstrong\u2019s assertion that the Piltdown hoax was promoted by Osborn in the Scopes Trial is hogwash. <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">That\u2019s a very interesting claim indeed , since I never <em>stated<\/em> this. It\u2019s pulled out of thin air. Here are the two consecutive paragraphs in which I mentioned Dr. Osborn, Piltdown Man, the Scopes trial, and Nebraska Man. None of the four are mentioned again in the paper, I do mention Piltdown Man in one comment, but add nothing essential to what I had already stated:<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">We\u2019re baffled how intelligent scientists could be fooled by\u00a0<a class=\"ext-link decorated-link\" style=\"color: #0066cc;\" title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Piltdown_Man\" rel=\"nofollow\" data-wpel-target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\">Piltdown Man\u00a0<\/a>for 41 years (!).\u00a0<span style=\"color: #252525;\">\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"ext-link decorated-link\" style=\"color: #0b0080;\" title=\"Henry Fairfield Osborn\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Henry_Fairfield_Osborn\" rel=\"nofollow\" data-wpel-target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\">Henry Fairfield Osborn<\/a><span style=\"color: #252525;\">, President of the\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"ext-link decorated-link\" style=\"color: #0b0080;\" title=\"American Museum of Natural History\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/American_Museum_of_Natural_History\" rel=\"nofollow\" data-wpel-target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\">American Museum of Natural History<\/a><span style=\"color: #252525;\">, thought\u00a0\u00a0the jaw and skull belonged together \u201cwithout question\u201d.\u00a0<\/span>It turned out to be an obvious hoax:\u00a0the jawbone of an orangutan\u00a0attached to a human skull. Atheist paleontologist \u00a0(and great critical writer on the history of science) Stephen Jay Gould observed that it was immediately apparent that it had been tampered with \u2014 if only someone had bothered to<em>\u00a0look closely<\/em>\u00a0at the damned thing during all those years. Finally someone did. It just took 41 years . . .\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">But\u00a0it had been accepted for 41 years as a compelling proof of Darwinian human evolution, and thrown in the face of the folks at the\u00a0famous\u00a0<a class=\"ext-link decorated-link\" style=\"color: #0066cc;\" title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Scopes_Trial\" rel=\"nofollow\" data-wpel-target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\">Scopes trial\u00a0<\/a>in 1925 (I happened to visit that courtroom this summer).\u00a0<a class=\"ext-link decorated-link\" style=\"color: #0066cc;\" title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Nebraska_Man\" rel=\"nofollow\" data-wpel-target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\">Nebraska Man<\/a>: another silly so-called \u201cspecimen\u201d \u2014 was widely accepted from 1922 to 1927, and turned out to be a tooth of an extinct pig (<em>one tooth<\/em>\u00a0was the entire evidence for it). It\u2019s another case of intelligent scientists believing in folly.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Note that I never stated that Piltdown Man was \u201cpromoted by Osborn\u201d at the Scopes trial. I didn\u2019t connect Osborn to the trial <em>at all<\/em>. I noted that he was duped by Piltdown Man, and I also observed separately\u00a0that Piltdown Man was \u201cthrown in the face of the folks at the\u00a0famous\u00a0Scopes trial\u00a0in 1925.\u201d If Dr. Hurd can\u2019t grasp that I didn\u2019t do here what he claims I did, then I suggest he take a course in Logic 0101. Perhaps he missed that class in his general liberal arts undergraduate studies. I did not.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Piltdown Man was in fact introduced as evidence at the Scopes trial (I\u2019m not sure if Dr. Hurd would deny<em> that<\/em> or not). According to a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bradburyac.mistral.co.uk\/tenness5.html#pm\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">very in-depth website<\/a> devoted to the trial, it was mentioned in the affidavits of both\u00a0Fay-Cooper Cole (Professor of anthropology at the University of Chicago)<\/span> <span style=\"color: #000000;\">and\u00a0Horatio Hackett Newman (Dean of the College of Science at the<\/span> <span style=\"color: #000000;\">University of Chicago). The author of the long article states:<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549; padding-left: 30px;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">[I]n the third edition (1924) of his [Osborn\u2019s] book\u00a0<i>Men of the Old Stone Age<\/i>\u00a0we find this positively effusive assessment:<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"quote\" style=\"color: navy; padding-left: 60px;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">. . .\u00a0These precious geologic and archaeologic records furnish the only means we have of determining the age of\u00a0<i>Eoanthropus<\/i>, the \u2018dawn man\u2019, one of the most important and significant discoveries in the whole history of anthropology.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">He added: \u201cModern dating methods showed that none of the Piltdown fragments was more than 650 years old.\u201d In any event, Dr.\u00a0Osborn never showed up at the Scopes trial, as planned.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">But this lack of historical study, or basic familiarity with science also is reflected in his false assertion about \u201cNebraska Man\u201d even more closely associated with Osborn than the Piltdown hoax.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Huh? What is it that Dr. Hurd thinks I <em>claimed<\/em> about Nebraska Man? That I claimed it was part of the Scopes trial (I did not)? Who knows? But he \u201cknows\u201d I made a \u201cfalse assertion\u201d! What is <em>false<\/em> in what I wrote? I only gave it two sentences, and no one can dispute the facts I provided. Does he deny that it was \u201csilly\u201d or that scientific belief in it as a supposed hominid was \u201cfolly\u201d? Perhaps he will inform us exactly <em>what<\/em>\u00a0I supposedly stated that was in error.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">In 1922, Osborn received a fossil tooth from rancher and geologist Harold Cook who recovered it from his property in Nebraska. Osborn quickly announced Hesperopithecus haroldcookii as the first anthropoid ape from America (Osborn 1922a). Later that same year he wrote in the science magazine Nature, \u201cI have not stated that Hesperopithecus was either an Ape-man or in the direct line of human ancestry, because I consider it quite possible that we may discover anthropoid apes (Simiidae) with teeth closely imitating those of man (Hominidae), \u2026\u201d (Osborn 1922b). Osborn\u2019s rather odd ideas about human evolution (nearly all wrong) are clearly displayed in his American Philosophical Society at Philadelphia, and reprinted in Science Magazine, (Osborn 1927).<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">The Spring of 1925 saw the start of the first scientific excavation of the original location which had produced the tooth. These were conducted by Osborn\u2019s prot\u00e9g\u00e9e William K. Gregory. 1925 also saw a series of published articles constituting a debate between Osborn and creationist William Jennings Bryan in the months leading up to the \u201cScopes Monkey Trial.\u201d These were in the pages of most major USA news papers following their first appearance in the New York Times. Strikingly, Osborn\u2019s mention of the \u201cNebraska\u201d ape nearly disappears by July of that year. One must suspect that he had realized his error.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">None of the above has the slightest relation to anything I wrote or claimed, but to play along, it might be fun for my readers to take note of how Dr. Osborn taunted William Jennings Bryan. According to the lengthy Scopes website:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: black; padding-left: 30px;\">Osborn frequently used Nebraska Man as a \u2018stick\u2019 with which to beat Bryan in the popular press.\u00a0In 1922 he jokingly (?) suggested that Nebraska Man might have been better named as\u00a0<i>Bryopithecus<\/i>\u201cafter the most most distinguished Primate which the State of Nebraska has thus far produced.\u201d\u00a0As late as May 1925 he wrote an article for\u00a0<i>The Forum<\/i>, entitled \u201cThe Earth Speaks to Bryan\u201d (a play on Job 12:8 \u2013 \u201cSpeak to the earth and it shall teach thee\u201d), in which he asked:<\/p>\n<p class=\"quote\" style=\"color: navy; padding-left: 60px;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">What shall we do with the Nebraska tooth? \u2026 Certainly we shall not banish this bit of Truth because it does not fit in with our preconceived notions and because at present it constitutes infinitesimal but irrefutable evidence that the man-ape wandered over from Asia into North America.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"quote\" style=\"color: navy;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Loads of fun at the expense of the \u201cignorant\u201d Christian, Bryan (who believed in an old earth), huh? Hee hee ha ha ho ho! But it turns out the last laugh was at the expense of Dr. Osborn. We may surmise that he didn\u2019t show up at the trial because of mounting evidence against his stupid tooth. I agree with Dr. Hurd in this way. So why is he bashing me? On what basis?<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">The results of the professional excavations begun in 1925 retracting the identification of \u201cHesperopithecus haroldcookii\u201d were published in the science literature in late 1927, and in the popular press soon afterwards (Gregory 1927) (New York Times, London Times, and Scientific American all ran articles, and editorials). This is in direct contradiction to Mr. Armstrong\u2019s false assertion that \u201cOf course we don\u2019t hear much about it, but these follies and imbecilities assuredly happened, \u2026\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">This is all one big <em>non sequitur<\/em>. I never <em>denied<\/em> that scientific magazines, etc., produced retractions. The point of my paper is that in popular polemics (including on atheist sites at Patheos) and in public schools, these facts are only rarely presented. Now its true that in the paper I didn\u2019t make this totally clear. But in the same combox that Dr. Hurd commented int, two hours before his comment, I had written: \u201cIt\u2019s not taught in schools; it\u2019s never brought up in the context of blathering exaggerated criticism of Christians and the Galileo fiasco, etc. I\u2019ve explained this over and over.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">This clearly shows my<em> intent<\/em>. And nothing I wrote (or have ever written <em>anywhere<\/em> in 19 years online, or before) can demonstrate that I ever denied that science openly publishes retractions of its mistaken or debunked theories. To the contrary, I cited Stephen Jay Gould, the atheist paleontologist and historian of science, who wrote about all kinds of \u201cfollies\u201d in science, including Piltdown Man.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">I\u2019d venture to guess that if I ran down his article on that, he would have been more harsh on scientists than I am here. I assumed that any educated person would know that science is about an ongoing pursuit of truth, which necessarily includes retraction of errors. That was not my beef in the first place. But Dr. Hurd assumed that I was an ignoramus.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Mr. Armstrong also presented Osborn as a Scientist Who Was Wrong! representing those nasty Atheist baby killers. <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Triple \u201chuh?!\u201d with big head scratch. I said not a word about his character, other than that he made a dumb mistake (the theme of my paper), let alone about any association of Osborn with abortion.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Ronald Rainger, a professional historian has noted that Osborn was \u201ca devout Christian \u2014 born into a Presbyterian family he attended Princeton College in the 1870s, which was still strongly Presbyterian. In later years he began to attend services at St. John the Divine, a major Episcopal Church in New York City, primarily because of social connections. Politically he was quite reactionary, and highly opposed to materialism in any form.\u201d (For more see: Rainger\u2019s intellectual biography of Osborn, 1991 \u201cAn Agenda for Antiquity\u201d University of Alabama Press).<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Wonderful! This has nothing whatsoever to do with anything I claimed. Osborn\u2019s religious status had nothing to do with anything. Virtually all of the scientists I mentioned in my notorious, dreaded, horrific Catalogue of Scientific Folly were Christians, too (excepting Newton, an Arian, which is still theist). Ho hum. Most of the greatest scientists and originators of virtually every scientific field <em>were<\/em> Christians.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">There are a few important events in Osborn\u2019s career that give an insight as to why he would have been so quick to see a North American ape, and also related to his overt racism and promotion of a perverted American version of Eugenics;<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Birth in 1857 to a very wealthy family.<\/span> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">1891, appointment to Columbia University as professor of zoology, and the American Museum of Natural History, Curator for Vertebrate Paleontology.<\/span> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">November 23, 1897 he was elected member of the Boone and Crockett Club,<\/span> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Elected president of American Museum of Natural History Board of Trustees, 1908-1933<\/span> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">President of the New York Zoological Society from 1909 to 1925.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Why these are significant should be the focus of a later comment on Mr. Armstrong\u2019s incompetent remarks on the Nazi Holocaust and Eugenics. (Shapiro 2008 should be advanced reading).<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Once again, Dr. Hurd is welcome to make an argument that the Nazis were <em>not<\/em> involved in eugenics (contrary to my claim). Till he does, I won\u2019t waste my time <em>guessing<\/em> what he might mean. I\u2019ve already wasted enough with this (what was his term?) hogwash.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Gregory, William K.\u00a0<\/span> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">1927. \u201cHesperopithecus apparently not an ape nor a man,\u201d Science, n.s. 66, pp. 579-581<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Osborn H.F.\u00a0<\/span> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">1922a \u201cHesperopithecus, the first anthropoid primate found in America\u201d Science, 55:463-5.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Osborn H.F.\u00a0<\/span> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">1922b \u201cHesperopithecus, the anthropoid primate of western Nebraska\u201d Nature, 110:281-3.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Osborn H.F.\u00a0<\/span> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">1927 \u201cRECENT DISCOVERIES RELATING TO THE ORIGIN AND ANTIQUITY OF MAN\u201d Science 20 May 1927: 481-488.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #3f4549;\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Shapiro, Jonathan Peter<\/span> <span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">2008 \u201cDefending the Master Race: Conservation, Eugenics, and the Legacy of Madison Grant\u201d Univ. of Vermont Press<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Thanks for the sources (all perfectly irrelevant to my argument).<\/span><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Henry Fairfield Osborn (1857-1935) in 1919: sadly mistaken Nebraska Man and Piltdown Man enthusiast [public domain \/ Wikimedia Commons] * * * * * Dr. Gary S. Hurd\u00a0received a doctorate in Social Science (emphasis in Anthropology) from the University of California, Irvine in 1976. For the next 10 years he\u00a0was a medical researcher and professor [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2331,"featured_media":3895,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124,112],"tags":[267,258,1115,433,1110,501,1114,492,1113,1094,1112,1109,1111],"class_list":["post-3894","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-atheism-agnosticism","category-philosophy-science","tag-agnosticism","tag-atheism","tag-charles-darwin","tag-evolution","tag-henry-fairfield-osborn","tag-history-of-science","tag-hominids","tag-human-evolution","tag-nebraska-man","tag-piltdown-man","tag-scopes-trial","tag-stephen-jay-gould","tag-william-jennings-bryan"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>My Claims Regarding Piltdown Man &amp; the Scopes Trial Twisted<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Atheists or agnostics often mistakenly portray a Christian as basically ignorant with regard to the fundamental nature of science. 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Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. They have three sons and a daughter, and reside in southeast Michigan (metro Detroit).\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/\",\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@LuxVeritatisApologetics\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/author\/davearmstrong\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"My Claims Regarding Piltdown Man & the Scopes Trial Twisted","description":"Atheists or agnostics often mistakenly portray a Christian as basically ignorant with regard to the fundamental nature of science. 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Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \"This Rock\" (now called \"Catholic Answers Magazine\"), \"Envoy Magazine\" (Patrick Madrid), \"The Catholic Answer,\" \"The Coming Home Journal,\" \"Gilbert Magazine\" (American Chesterton Society), and \"The Latin Mass.\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \"The Michigan Catholic\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. Dave\u2019s apologetics and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of \"Envoy Magazine.\" He served as the staff moderator at the Internet discussion forum for The Coming Home Network, from 2007-2010. Dave has been interviewed on many nationally syndicated Catholic radio shows, including \"Catholic Answers Live\" (twice), \"Faith and Family Live\" (Steve Wood), \"Kresta in the Afternoon,\" \"Son Rise Morning Show,\" \"Catholic Connection\" (Teresa Tomeo), and \"The Catholics Next Door.\" His large and popular website, \"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism,\" was online from March 1997 to March 2007, and received the 1998 Catholic Website of the Year award from \"Envoy Magazine.\" His blog of the same name (now transferred to Patheos), begun in February 2004, contains more than 1,500 papers, at least 500 debates or dialogues, and over 50 distinct \"index\" web pages. Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \"Surprised by Truth\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \"The Catholic Verses\" (2004), \"The One-Minute Apologist\" (2007), \"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\" (2009), \"The Quotable Newman\" (editor: 2012), and \"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \"The New Catholic Answer Bible\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \"Quotable Wesley\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. 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