[meteorite-list] Fwd: More on the creationists at the Meteorite Festival

From: Robert Verish <bolidechaser_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Mon Jul 10 01:46:37 2006
Message-ID: <20060710054635.12843.qmail_at_web51701.mail.yahoo.com>

<http://jgrr.blogspot.com/2006/07/more-on-creationists-at-meteorite.html>

Thoughts from Kansas -
"More on the creationists at the Meteorite Festival"
Tuesday, July 04, 2006

I've been chatting with some of the good people of
Haviland, they of the giant meteorites, about what's
going on down there. What's the deal with the
meteorites, and why did they invite creationists to
come and do a lecture about them?

While I still have people I want to chat with, and I'm
not sure I fully appreciate the full breadth of the
situation (there are complex issues in the history of
science and religion that I'm sorting out), I think
I've basically got the situation in Haviland mapped
out.

The major phenomenon in Haviland is Barclay College, a
Quaker Bible college. This is where I'm fuzzy on
relevant history, but I'm hoping a professor in
England can help sort that out. I always thought of
Quakers as pretty much pro-evolution and pro-science,
not prone to young earth creationism, at least not
since the early 19th century.

But perhaps this represents a different take on the
Society of Friends, or perhaps conservative southwest
Kansas is having an influence on the Quakers' fairly
conciliatory attitude toward science. More on that
later. The fact of the matter is that Haviland is a
fairly creationist place. I chatted with Mayor Jeff
Christensen, who said he didn't see how the meteorites
could have been in the ground for thousands of years,
since he thinks the earth can't be more than 8,000
years old. And I mentioned that Marlene Lofgren was
familiar enough with the Creation Research Society to
invite them to join the festival. That's the setting.

At least, half of it. The other half began with the
discovery of the Brenham meteorite in the late 1800s
and a 1931 recovery of a meteorite in nearby
Beardsley, and subsequent discoveries of recent and
ancient meteorites throughout the area. Greensburg,
home of the world's largest hand-dug well also hosts a
1,000 pound piece of the Brenham meteorite excavated
in the area.

While you and I may not have known it, meteorite
hunting is a big hobby, and Dr. Don Stimpson, a
biophysicist originally from the Chicago area, took it
up in the '80s. His metal detector took him on
vacations to Trenton, Wisconsin to hunt meteorites,
and later to the Haviland area. When Ellis Peck,
author of Space Rocks and Buffalo Grass, sold the farm
where the Brenham meteorite was found, Stimpson bought
the land. He worked for 15 years at Barclay College
and hunted meteorites in his spare time. It was his
discovery of a number of large fragments that inspired
Haviland's mayor to think big. A museum or a learning
center focusing on meteorites might provide an
economic base that the community could use to grow and
expand other businesses.

That Stimpson accepts the age of the universe at 14
billion years, and that the meteorites may have lain
underground for 20,000 years doesn't seem to bother
Mayor Christensen. And that most of the town doesn't
seem to accept the scientific evidence behind the work
he's doing doesn't seem to bug Stimpson. In my
conversation with Dr. Stimpson, he showed a true love
of science. For Christensen, the issue first and
foremost is the growth and success of his town. For
Stimpson, the idea of a competition with Greensburg is
"overplayed."

Both men seemed more interested in getting along, a
necessary trait for people living in a town of 612
people. Stimpson says "I like all of the sciences,"
and he has plans to display his many interests at the
Meteorite festival. He'll talk about his meteorites,
and doesn't plan to soft-pedal the issue of their age.
He'll also have his metal detector, to talk with young
people about the science behind it. And to help
illustrate what he calls "the smallest meteorites,"
he'll have a bubble chamber to show the tracks of
cosmic rays. If he manages to light the spark in a few
minds, he'll be happy.

As for the creationists invited to speak at the
festival, all he cared to say was that he hadn't been
too involved in the planning of the event. "I tend to
stay focused on my little part of it," he explained.
He understands that not everyone believes what he
does, and he doesn't seem too bothered by that.

I did get the feeling that he enjoyed a conversation
with a kindred spirit, so anyone planning to attend
the festival this weekend should be sure to stop by
and chat with him. He can tell you about the
researcher who will be coming out to search the impact
crater with ground penetrating radar, a possible
prelude to a renaissance of scientific study of the
Brenham meteorite. And you can talk with him about his
hope for a meteorite museum in the community to honor
the heritage he's so carefully uncovered over the
years.

Jeff Christensen's interest in the festival is
different. As far as he's concerned, Marlene Lofgren
is just "a good Christian woman" who wanted to see
that "both sides of the story were presented," and he
clearly is inclined to prefer her side. While Stimpson
is excited by the prospect of bringing scientists in
to study the meteorites, Christensen is more excited
about seeing whether enough tourists show an interest
in the festival to justify the construction of a
meteorite learning center. He envisions school groups
and tourists making Haviland a destination, and
serving the needs of those tourists could help the
town sustain itself against the draw of Wichita and
the coasts. Disagreements over the ages of the
meteorites don't seem to bother him.

How a museum would handle the age issue isn't entirely
clear. Reliable dating puts the entire class of
pallasite meteorites at 4.2 to 4.5 billion years old,
and their structure gives a glimpse into the early
stages of the formation of planets. To ignore that
science would be a disservice to the children and
tourists, but it isn't clear that the community would
be comfortable with such a display. I hope to talk
with some more community members and explore their
views on that and other topics.

posted by Josh Rosenau at 11:36 PM
Comments (6)
Received on Mon 10 Jul 2006 01:46:35 AM PDT