Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
(129)
No crater has yet been found for the hypothesized single impact.
(138)
The data in this figure alone is [
sic
] sufficient to rule out the Chicxulub structure as an impact
site of K-T age.
(152)
One of the things that did not happen at the K-T boundary was an impact by a gigantic meteor-
ite.
(157)
An unnamed “acquaintance” said of Luis Alvarez, “Fantastic ego. Loved to tell how amazed
the groups he lectured to were at how young he was. He would brag so openly you would
chuckle.”
(81)
4
The Alvarez hypothesis has collapsed. [It is] degenerate . . . not merely pathological science
but dangerous to boot.
(185)
Most of the “science” performed by the Alvarez camp has been so inexplicably weak, and the
response to it so eagerly accepting by important segments of the scientific press (never mind
the popular press and the tabloids), that some skeptics have wondered if the entire affair was
not, on the impact side, some kind of scam.
(XIII)
These false facts and ad hominem attacks are the kind of arguments used by those
who deny evolution, who reject global warming, who claim that HIV does not
cause AIDS, and who believe that vaccines cause autism. This is not science but
science denial.
Let us recall that Officer and Drake were not paleontologists, and it was the
fossil specialists whom the Alvarez theory most offended. Some saw no need to go
out of their way to refute the theory, as they believed that paleontology had long
established what had killed the dinosaurs. In a presentation at a 1982 conference,
one paleontologist said:
A satisfactory explanation of the cause of the extinction of the dinosaurs has been known for
some years. Probably more than 99.99999% of all the species that have ever existed on the
Earth are now extinct. The dinosaurs are among these. Extinction is the normal way of life. As
far as is currently known, it does not seem necessary to invoke an unusual event to account for
the demise of the dinosaurs.
5
Others thought they could make short work of the Alvarez theory. The verteb-
rate paleontologists William Clemens and David Archibald, along with the plant
specialist Leo Hickey, wasted no time responding. The title of their article, “Out
