Auroras, Petroglyphs, and Pagans

Page 109 of the book Auroras, Petroglyphs, and Pagans contains the following.

It was 1980 before the suggestion that Earth had had global catastrophes became accepted widely. That is when the paper “Extraterrestrial Cause for the Cretaceous-Tertiary Extinction” (“about 65 million years ago”) was published. [Alvarez, 1980]

The Preface, Page x, of that same book says,

“Before the Alvarezes’ paper, it was very difficult to publish papers containing claims that catastrophes were the cause of major changes on the Earth. After their paper, it became difficult to publish papers supporting the old idea of pure uniformity or only smaller scale catastrophes.”

A geologist, Charles Officer, and a science writer, Jake Page, documented part of this problem in The Great Dinosaur Extinction Controversy, where they presented information such as the fact that the extinctions began many millions of years before the K-T boundary that is dated to the time around the Alvarez impact. They noted that “some paleontologists fear their careers may be impeded if they oppose the currently fashionable theory that a meteorite collided with Earth and caused the extinction of the dinosaurs some 65 million years ago” [Officer, p. 103]. They note, in particular, that Science magazine did not present a balanced view. They said that one of the Science writers commented, “dissenting views would not find airing in Science” [Officer, p. 109].

Dewey McLean, while he was a geology professor at Virginia Polytechnic University, said: “Some [scientists] tell of threats to silence them” [McLean]. By 2010, “The panel [of 41 international scientists], which reported in the journal Science, were set up in order to end debate over what caused the massed [sic] extinction at the end of the Cretaceous Period” [Alleyne]. The panel’s conclusion may be correct, but in general, phrases like silence the opposition and end debate sound like religious or political phrases.

Since it was difficult to have a rational scientific discussion about a subject involving catastrophes and not involving myths, you can see that it would have been even more difficult to have a rational scientific discussion about catastrophes causing myths.

It is often very difficult to publish information about catastrophes that occurred within the time of ancient people. Numerous authors have indicated that the ancients did not see what we see. People suggesting that ancient mythology contained historical information that could be useful in the scientific area has been done at least since the eighteenth century. Some also told of threats to silence them. This behavior is well known in politics, but unfortunately it also happens occasionally in the scientific community.

It appears that rationality has returned to this part of science. Some researchers, who seem to support the opinion of Officer from 1996, have just published a paper indicating that the asteroids and volcanoes had help in killing off the dinosaurs. “Here we advance the hypothesis along with supporting evidence that the emergence of toxic plants coupled with an inability to form learned taste aversions may have contributed to the extinction of dinosaurs.” [Frederick]

Alleyne, Richard, Dinosaurs wiped out by asteroid impact that turned earth into a 'hellish' place, March 4, 2010, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/dinosaurs/7368548/Dinosaurs-wiped-out-by-asteroid-impact-that-turned-earth-into-a-hellish-place.html

Alvarez, Luis, W., Walter Alvarez, Frank Asaro, Helen V. Michel, Extraterrestrial Cause for the Cretaceous-Tertiary Extinction, Science, 6 June 1980, Vol. 208, No. 4448, p. 1095. Retrieved on November 5, 2016, from http://earthscience.rice.edu/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Alvarez_K-Timpact_Science80.pdf

Frederick, Michael, and Gordon G. Gallup, Jr., The demise of dinosaurs and learned taste aversions: The biotic revenge hypothesis, Ideas in Ecology and Evolution, February 14, 2018. Retrieved an April 6, 2018 from https://ojs.library.queensu.ca/index.php/IEE/article/view/6802

Mclean, Dewey, Excerpt from his Open Letter to Luis Alvarez, 1988, In a letter to Alvarez, McLean said, “Operating in a science you do not comprehend, you publicly insult paleontologists. In the [note] you abased paleontologists as ‘not very good scientists...more like stamp collectors,’ and attacked opponents by name as ‘weak sister,’ ‘incompetent,’ and ‘publishing scientific nonsense.’ In your own field, you have stated ‘There is no democracy in physics. We can't say that some second-rate guy has as much right to opinion as Fermi’ [in Greenberg, The Politics of Pure Science, 1967, p. 43]. Now, you would deny paleontologists the right to opinion in their own field. Some tell of threats to silence them.”

Officer, Charles and Jake Page, The Great Dinosaur Extinction Controversy, 1996, Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0-201-48384-X