>3) RE paleontology, the claim is made that most of the hominid fossil finds
>involve only 1 or 2 bones, with the rest being made up. The strong
>impression is given that evolutionists create most of any given fossil, and
>that many of them are outright frauds (Piltdown Man, Java Man). Can anyone
>refute this? For instance, how many complete skeletons do we have for the
>various fossil men (and women)?
I will give you two quotes one from a young earth creationist and one from
an evolutionist both attesting to a big number of fossil men. First the
creatinoist, Marvin Lubenow:
"Africa--1390 fossil individuals discoveredthrough 1976.
Europe and the U.S.S.R.--1516 fossil individuals discovered
through 1970 (the figure for France, one of the most prolific
fossil areas, goes only through 1969).
The americas, Asia, and Australasia--1092 fossil individuals
discovered through 1974. "~Marvin L. Lubenow, Bones of
Contention, (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1992), p. 29
Now Johanson and Blake,
"From the earliest period of hominid evolution, more than 4
million years ago, only a handful of largely undiagnostic fossils
had been found, including the mandible fragments from the Kenyan
sites of Lothagam and Tabarin. The situation improved in this
decade with the recent discovery and naming of Ardipithecus
ramidus, which lived about 4.4 million years ago. this species
is known from forty-three specimens of several individuals,
including a partial skeleton that has yet to be described. All
the specimens come from the site of Aramis in the Middle Awash
region of Ethiopia. There are twenty-four specimens, about half
of them dental remains, of Australopithecus anamensis, a species
from Kanapoi and Allia Bay in northern Kenya that lived just
before 4 million years ago."
"The best represented early hominid is Australopithecus
afarensis, which lived between 4 and 3 million years ago in East
Africa. Its remains number 324 specimens of at least 111
individuals from Hadar, Ethiopia, and thirty-one specimens from
Laetoli, Tanzania. The best known specimens are the partial
skeleton A.L. 288-1, or Lucy, and 214 bones from thirteen
individuals from the single locality A.L. 333. Other fossils
that most liekly belong to this species include a 3.9 million-
year-old partial frontal bone from Belohdelie, Ethiopia and some
fragmentary remains from Omo Shungura and Fejej, Ethipoia, and
Koobi Fora, Kenya.
"In South Africa, the species Australopithecus africanus is
represented by at least 120 individuals from Sterkfontein alone,
plus the single individual from Taung, and a few from
Makapanstage. The most abundant South African hominid site is the
cave of Swartkrans, where painstaking excavation of breccia has
yielded about 200 Australopithecus robustus, and six Homo
fossils, which can [be] attributed to a minimum of eighty-five
individuals and six individuals,, respectively.
"The earliest form of robust australopithecine in East
Africa is Australopithecus aethiopicus ('southern ape of
Ethiopia'). It appeared about 2.5 million years ago and is known
from three specimens belonging to three individuals: the
toothless partial mandible Omo 18, from Ethiopia, and from west
Lake Turkana, Kenya, the partial mandible KNM-WT 16005 and the
cranium KNM-WT 17000, better known as the Black Skull. A fourth
specimen that might be attributed to this species, or
alternatively to early Homo, is the mandible KNM-ER 1482 from
Koobi Fora.
"From between 2.4 and 1.2 million years ago, the period in
which genus Homo evolved in Africa and began populating other
continents, the hominid fossil record of East Africa consists of
about 300 specimens of crania, mandibles, and teeth. a third of
these belong to Australopithecus bosei, such as the crania OH 5
and KNM-ER 406, eighty-five belong to Homo, and the rest cannot
be identified to a particular hominid. An additional fifty
postcranial bones round out the hominid sample from this time
period.
"African Homo fossils from this period can be assigned to
the species Habilis, rudolfensis, and ergaster. The sample of H.
habilis fossils includes thirty-three specimens from Olduvai
Gorge, including seven partial crania, four mandibles, assorted
limb bones and teeth, and a fragmentary partial skeleton. About
half a dozen specimens from Koobi Fora can be included in this
species, the most complete being the cranium KNM-ER 1813.
Several teeth, two mandibles and a very fragmentary cranium from
Omo may also belong to H. habilis. Homo rudolfensis is
represented by several specimens from Koobi Fora, most notably
the cranium KNM-ER 1470, which was the type specimen used ot
name this species in 1986, and the mandible of a separate
individual, KNM-ER 1802. Another probably H. rudolfensis
specimen is the 2.4 million-year-old mandible UR 501 from Malawi.
Homo ergaster is better represented by several specimens from
Koobi Fora and West Turkana, Kenya, including the type specimen
mandible KNM-ER 992, the crania of KNM-ER 3773 and 3883, and the
skeleton of KNM-WT 15000, as well as the partial cranium SK847
from South Africa.
"Outside of Africa, the oldest hominid remains belong to
Homo erectus. Specimens from at least forty-eight H. erectus
individuals--a third of the total worldwide sample of this
species--have been found in Java, mainly at Trinil, Sangiran,
Ngandong, and Modjokerto. These fossils include crania,
skullcaps, and skull fragments from thirty individuals, jaws or
jaw teeth. Another third of the world's erectus fossils come
from China, mainly from the single site of Zhoukoudian, where
forty-five hominid specimens from fifteen individuals were
recovered.
"From the Middle Pleistocene, Homo heidelbergensis is
represented by hundreds of bones from at least thirty individuals
from Atapuerca and four individuals at the nearby site of Gran
Dolina, plus tweny others, usually partial or complete crania,
from elsewhere in Europe and Africa. Much more abundant are the
Neandertals, the probable direct descendants of H.
heidelbergensis. Remains of about 500 H. neanderthalensis
individuals have been discovered, largely in western Europe,
central Europe, and the Near East.
"From this brief inventory, it is clear that
paleoanthrologists have accumulated a large sampling of fossil
evidence from at least some hominid species although disagreement
as to how to classify and interpret this evidence persists. Only
by gradually filling in the gaps in the fossil record can we hope
to arrive at the correct interpretation of our past."~Donald
Johanson and Blake Edgar, From Lucy to Language, (New York: Simon
and Schuster, 1997), p. 22-23
Also, with neanderthal, they claim that
>the first finds were individuals with rickets, which made them stooped
>over, but really they're just like us.
Other than the shape of the skull, they were very much like us. Their bones
were thicker. They were probably much stronger than us. But they made
flutes, tents, beds, pavements, built walls, engaged in some artwork. They
were much like us.
> Surely by now there are many good
>fossils... is it not true that neanderthal display some distinct
>differences from Homo Sapiens? Does anyone know of a good source on the
>topic of fossil man? (Glenn, does your book address any of these aspects?)
>
My book addresses all of these issues and more.Another good source is
Shreeve's Neanderthal Enigma.
>Regarding the early cases of fraud, I have always been under the impression
>that other evolutionary scientists brought these cases to light. Is this
>correct?
Yes. Piltdown was rejected by Franz Weidenreich as a fraud when it was
announced but he didn't have the data to prove it. Kenneth Oakley in 1953
or so was the one who proved that the skull and the jaw didn't belong
together. The skull may be a real fossil hominid but it is now tainted heavily.
glenn
Adam, Apes, and Anthropology: Finding the Soul of Fossil Man
and
Foundation, Fall and Flood
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm