A Chicken Is Not Pillage

Jack Horner Responds

This is a Letter to the Editor worth reading.  And in case anybody missed the obvious ... I agree with him.

You Call THAT A Controversy?

File this under things I really need help understanding.  It seems that our beloved Jack Horner delayed telling the world at large about the largest Tyrannosaurus skeleton ever found ... for reasons of marketing a movie.  That news apparently isn't going over well with the scientific community.

Now I have my own issues with Dr. Horner (based on his rather stubborn insistence that T. Rex was over all a scavenger), but this controversy I really don't understand.  I understand the list of grievances given by Dr. Free-Ride in the link above, but I think they melt away in the face of the circumstances.  Paleontology now has the skeleton (actually the Museum of the Rockies has it, but you know what I mean).  The good folks of planet Earth know about it.  No harm, no foul?  If there is a conflict here, I think it revolves around which view of science and discovery one subscribes to.  Is science in service to the truth?  Is science in service to humanity's knowledge base?  Are scientists just doing a job, and like the rest of us, able to pragmatically choose the best way to get by in that job?

Take my word for it, the Hell Creek dig isn't an inexpensive lark in the hills.  If Universal Studios can help fund the project with a whole string of Jurassic Park movies, than I'm all for it.  And science suffered only the indignity of a silent pause.  So I don't get the disillusionment with Dr. Jack.  Maybe somebody can help me out here?