Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
OneNewsNow reports that Ken Ham is deep in preparations for next year's 150th anniversary of the publishing of Darwin's On the Origin of Species in 1859. and how does he intend to do that? With new exhibits at his museum:
"We're going to have a couple [of] special exhibits opened: one on natural selection, showing that natural selection is not evolution; and another one on ape-men, showing that they are either apes or people and not in between. But we're doing this in ready for the Darwin year," Ham explains.
I can't wait to see that second one. The problem that creationists have always had is that while they claim that all the hominid specimens we have are either all-ape or all-human, with nothing in between at all, they simply can't agree on which specimens are ape and which are human. Jim Foley has a handy chart showing several of the major hominid specimens and how the major creationist writers classify them:
The very fact that they don't know which ones are ape and which are human strongly suggests that they are intermediate in between.
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I am curious as to their criteria for determining what is ape and what is human. I can understand why Java Man might be under debate, simply because of the lack of available material from the zygomatics and below. The rest though, clearly show a tendency towards bipedality (human only trait, through positioning of the foramen magnum), along with a detraction in the chin (again, a human only trait) and a flattening of the face.
Have they made any commentaries about Sahalenthropus tchadensis or Orrorin tugensis? These two are even closer to non human primates, especially in cranial capacity and mental eminence projection. I don't know why I am asking, cause they would probably definitely categorize them as hominid than hominin.
Posted by: Donna | September 21, 2008 10:18 AM
As a person who works in museums, I can tell you that real museums react to that place with bemused horror. We're bemused at its pretensions, but horrified at the idiocy it pumps out and the money it devours for its cause. After all, there only so many dollars available for museums.
Posted by: I am so wise | September 21, 2008 10:21 AM
I don't think Ham cares about being definitive for each specimen. He only cares about being definitive about the concept in general. I could see him including the Foley diagram in his exhibit as proof that there is a consensus amongst creationists that the specimens are either entirely ape or entirely man.
BTW, would Ham even argue that Piltdown man is not a mix of ape and man?
Posted by: Ex-drone | September 21, 2008 10:43 AM
Er, humans are apes.
Posted by: BaldApe | September 21, 2008 10:57 AM
Er, humans are apes.
I think maybe they're "great apes". I think there's a distinction between "apes" and "great apes".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ape:
So in other words: you're right, and you're wrong too. Everybody is right and everybody is wrong. Hope that helps!
Posted by: 386sx | September 21, 2008 11:54 AM
But, but, but, evilutionists have different opinions on things all the time! Besides, your chart was intelligently designed, so it proves g..., the designer!
Posted by: Science Avenger | September 21, 2008 12:39 PM
My understanding (and my primatology courses were a LONG time ago) is that Great Apes include Gorilla, Orangutan, Chimp, Bonobo and Human. Lesser or Smaller (I believe that smaller is the preferred term nowadays) Apes are the Gibbons.
Posted by: Donna | September 21, 2008 12:45 PM
Re: apes and humans.
I believe that, according to the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, the official names can only be given to clades, meaning that every member of the group must be more closely related to every other member than to anything outside the group. So if we take the term 'ape' to mean a member of the group which includes chimpanzees and gorillas (say), then humans are certainly apes, because chimps are more closely related to humans than they are to gorillas.
Disclaimer: I study plants, so I may have gotten some of this wrong. Any zoologists want to back me up?
Posted by: Alex, FCD | September 21, 2008 1:39 PM
Clearly, Cuozzo is the only self respecting Creationist scientist in that motley crew.
Human "fossils"? - ridiculous!
A human remains that looks like an ape? Blasphemy.
Palin/Cuozzo 2012
Posted by: Gingerbaker | September 21, 2008 2:46 PM
At Ham's Flintstone Sin & Salvation show, work is proceeding at a frantic pace to complete the new
Lady Hope Pavillion
In an uncannily realistic recreation of Darwin's summer house, an exhibit is being constructed to show not only Darwin, but at least 12 other noted scientists and atheists on their deathbeds animatronically recanting their former beliefs and accepting Christ as their saviour before thier souls convincingly depart from their bodies and waft heavenward.
The reported $6 million price tag for the exhibit also includes a VIP only theater, where a tableau in which the comely 35 year old Elizabeth Cotton (Lady Hope) animatronically gyrates and screws her 69 year old husband, retired Admiral Sir James Hope, to the point of post coital cardiac arrest. It is reported that the voices for Sir James and Lady Hope will be performed by none other than John McCain and Sarah Palin in gratitutde for Ham's blessing and endorsement.
Posted by: Benjamin Franklin | September 21, 2008 3:43 PM
I can't stop laughing :-D
Wrong. It would be a very good idea, but it has never been introduced. Evolution isn't mentioned in the Code in any way, shape or form. If you want to name a paraphyletic taxon, nobody can stop you. Even if you want to name a polyphyletic taxon, nobody can stop you!
The ICBN, too, does not even recommend naming only clades.
You must have been thinking of the PhyloCode :-)
LOL! Did he really die that way? :-D
Posted by: David Marjanović | September 21, 2008 4:37 PM
David-
No. He died four years after they were married, whereupon Lady Hope promptly pissed away his entire estate. Ten years after the Admiral scuttled, she married an Irish businessman 24 years her senior, and she blew through his money as well. Almost penniless, she went to America to further evangelize with the temperence movement. It was it at this point that she came up with the "Darwin Deathbed Conversion" story.
Quite a piece of work. The Anna Nicole Smith of her age, only without the tits.
Posted by: Benjamin Franklin | September 21, 2008 4:49 PM
I love that chart. I've thrown it at literally hundreds of creationists. I've never gotten a single decent response.
And the proper counter to the, "But evilutionists disagree about stuff all the time" line is to point out that the creationists invariably argue that the line between human-kind and ape-kind is obvious. Absolutely obvious. If they are going to claim that there ARE.NO.TRANSITIONS, then they must point to a clear and obvious lack of transitions. The only thing obvious from the chart is that they can't find such a gap.
As for Piltdown, if creationists were logically consistent (ha!), they would argue that it isn't a fake. After all, the primary evidence of it being faked are the fact that it didn't fit into the tree forming from all the other fossils (creationists deny such a tree exists) and that the jaw and skull dated differently when tested (creationists deny those tests are trustworty). They should be arguing that it is good evidence that scientists are just throwing away because it doesn't match their preconceptions!
Posted by: Michael Suttkus, II | September 21, 2008 8:04 PM
Ed, I had an update to that webpage ready to go, so I've just installed it (at http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/compare.html). I've added a new author (Line 2005), who disagrees with all previous efforts. And there's another interesting new development in that now we have a couple of cases in which individual creationists cannot decide whether individual skulls are ape or human! And yet, they still claim they aren't transitional. It's absolutely surreal.
Posted by: Jim Foley | September 21, 2008 9:04 PM
Alex, FCD-
I'm not a taxonomist, but my understanding is that a taxon should be a clade, but that it is not a requirement. Reptilia is still a Class, but that clade would include birds and mammals, which are of course separate Classes.
The International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature apparently deals with taxa from the Family level down, so my Class level example is perhaps not relevant. OTOH, in a quick browse through the Online version of the Code I did not see any reference to clades, and "clade" is not in the glossary.
I love it, BTW, when students try to insist that they are not animals. My reply goes like this:
Cells without cell walls? Check
Multicellular? Check
You're an animal.
Posted by: BaldApe | September 21, 2008 9:59 PM
I just love creationists acknowledging the significance of Darwin's book. It's just proof that he has had an incredible impact on scientific thought, an impact that is completely undeniable.
Posted by: JStein | September 22, 2008 12:45 AM
BaldApe - How about:
Cells without thick cell walls?
Lack of Chloroplasts in cells?
Cells contain Mitochondria?
All yes = animal. But other combos give fungi, plants, archaea etc.
But am I right? -Curiously DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | September 22, 2008 3:57 AM
As opposed to Grape apes.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp, KoT | September 22, 2008 8:05 AM
DingoJack,
Plants have cell walls made of cellulose.
Fungi have cell walls made of chitin.
Plants do have mitochondria as well as chloroplasts.
Algae, some non-algal protists, and prokaryotes have cell walls, but are not multicellular.
To qualify as animal it is sufficient to be multicellular and lack cell walls. At least among the Kingdoms of life on Earth. Elsewhere, things could be different.
Posted by: BaldApe | September 26, 2008 8:35 PM
As opposed to Grape apes.
Oh yes, Grape ape is a really great ape too! The greatest ape of all.
Posted by: 386sx | September 26, 2008 10:37 PM
To claim that nothing can explode is anything but science.
Or that what is scientifically impossible becomes possible over time is nonsense.
The only reason that people don't like to teach the theory of creation alongside the theory of evolution is that they fear the truth. And like all false religions they must use violence or insults to defend their faith. They try to propagate a myth that science and scripture are contradictory. The only thing that contradicts scripture is bad science. As it should.
Evolutionist definition of Hydrogen: A gas which - if left long enough turns into people.
It is ironic that the very same people who deny the existence of God because they cannot see Him, embrace the religion of evolution without seeing any transitional forms, or having any observational proof of any form of macro evolution.
There are even people who deny Intelligent Design, totally ignoring the discovery of DNA. The evidence is staggering.
All the frauds (Piltdown Man, Nebraska Man, etc) not only are not withdrawn but they continue to publish them even knowing they are frauds. Anyone who takes a single tooth (pig's tooth) and builds an entire skeletal structure and calls it a missing link is more than desperate.
Just calling a theory science doesn't make it fact.
Evolution is a religion. It is believed in on blind faith. So it is no wonder they are so defensive when the facts prove their faith out to be a big hoax.
The truth will set you free.
Posted by: Mark | November 14, 2009 8:30 PM
Wow. This Dembski student appears to be even more stupid than usual.
Posted by: Savagemutt | November 14, 2009 8:33 PM
Weapons-grade, even.
All snark aside, Mark, if you want to have a serious discussion, have a go. Pick a point from your morass above and offer a defense of it. Then read over the responses and proceed. I'll even give a starting point - The TalkOrigins page on Piltdown Man:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/piltdown.html
On the other hand, if all you want to do is leave the impression that you will never amount to anything, well, mission accomplished.
Posted by: NJ | November 14, 2009 9:04 PM
Mark said:
Big Bang reference? You do know that the Theory of Evolution is a Biological theory and not a Cosmological one don't you? Of course nobody is teaching that.The only reasons that people oppose teaching Creationism in public schools are that 1)it is religious indoctrination,and 2) it has absolutely no evidence for it and is in fact contradicted by the mountains of evidence against it. Science takes no position one way or the other on the truth or falseness of any religion. There is, however, the fact that the evidence flatly contradicts a literal reading of Genesis. There is also the fact that many "evolutionists" are devout practicing Christians and that denominations representing a majority of the world's Christians have made their peace with evolution. No. Just no. 1. I already mentioned that a large number of "evolutionists" are believing Christians. 2. Those who deny God have way more reasons than that for not believing in Him. Oh boy. The old "Evolution is a religion" canard. No sacred texts, no sacred truths, no prophets, no gods, no tithes, no temples or churches, no priests and NO FAITH. Transitional forms? You want transitional forms? We got transitional forms!There's a lot more where that came from but I'm trying to avoid moderation. Macro evolution? More creationist BS. I have a couple questions no creationist ever answers: What stops "micro evolution" from becoming "macro evolution" over time? What or where is the barrier between the 2? It's natural to disbelieve things for which there isn't a down payment on a shred of evidence. Ignoring DNA? Seriously? It's actually intensely studied in the life sciences, and the more that is learned the more that it supports evolution. Yes. The evidence for Evolution is staggering. Now this is a bald-faced lie. The fraud and the mistake you mentioned were discovered to be such by scientists. They were never universally accepted before that and have not been considered evidence since before I was born. (I'm 50) The word theory doesn't mean what you think it means. Dealt with the first sentence already. It's accepted (not believed)by scientifically literate people because the overwhelming weight of evidence supports it. We get angry when people lie about it. Yes it will. You should give it a try sometime.
Posted by: tresmal | November 14, 2009 9:39 PM