Nebraska Man

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[[File:Forestier Nebraska Man 1922.jpg|thumb|230px|right| This illustration of ''H. haroldcookii''  is believed to have been modeled on the Java Man.]]
'''Nebraska Man''' was the name of a [[hypothesis|hypothetical]] [[ape]] indigenous to North America, which was given the [[taxonomy|taxonomic]] name of ''Hesperopithecus haroldcookii''. It was proposed in 1922, but the identification was soon determined to be a mistake and the original proposal was formally retracted in 1927. 

The tale of Nebraska Man should have ended then and there, and the only reason anyone has ever heard of it today is because the [[creationist]] community has latched onto it as another "proof" of the great "evolutionary conspiracy."<ref>{{cite web|title=The Nebraska Man Scandal|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030424101711/http://www.darwinismrefuted.com/origin_of_man_16.html }}</ref>

==Discovery, proposal and rejection==

The existence of the [[primate]] was proposed by Henry Fairfield Osborn in 1922 based on the analysis of a tooth discovered by a rancher named Harold Cook in Hey, Nebraska in 1917. Osborn strongly  believed it to be the tooth of a primate and gave it the genus ''Hesperopithecus'' which roughly translates as 'ape of the west'. He published his claim in ''American Museum Novitates''.

Now Osborn was a [[Paleontology|paleontologist]] of some note — he was the first to identify both ''Tyrannosaurus rex'', and ''Velociraptor'' — and was president of the American Museum of Natural History for 25 years (which, incidentally, was the publisher of the ''American Museum Novitates'' journal). 

Having said that, Osborn was also very keen on [[eugenics]], and among other things insisted that only the "negroid" race had descended from apes in Africa, whereas white people had evolved separately (and earlier). He even received an honorary doctorate from [[Hitler]] for his work on eugenics.<ref>{{cite web|title=The Life And Controversies Of Henry Fairfield Osborn|author=Michael Barker|url=http://www.swans.com/library/art18/barker100.html|date=27 Feb 2012}}</ref>

So it is possible that Osborn had motivation to find evidence which supported his notion of an alternative evolutionary path for hominids. But regardless of Osborn's motives, his belief that he had found a primate tooth was not completely unreasonable.<ref name="CEJ">{{cite journal|author=John Wolf and James S. Mellett |year=1985 |title=The Role of "Nebraska Man" in the Creation-Evolution Debate |journal=Creation Evolution Journal |volume=5 |pages=31-43|issue=2}}</ref> A fossil of an antelope had been discovered in North America only a few years earlier, and this made the notion of a primate journeying from Africa or Asia plausible. Furthermore as a result of weathering and damage, the tooth did bear a striking resemblance to known hominid teeth.

Prudence would have suggested the best course of action at that time would have been to conduct further investigation. Osborn, however, gave in to hubris and had casts made of the tooth and submitted them to 26 institutions in Europe and North America. But the lack of corroborating evidence was a major issue, and for the most part, his discovery was ignored. One exception was the British anatomist Grafton Elliot Smith, who was so enthused he arranged for an artist to create a (fanciful) drawing of the new hominid.<ref name="CEJ"></ref>

However, further investigation in 1925 at the site determined that the tooth was actually from a {{wpl|peccary}} (a pig-like mammal) and was not from a primate at all. Osborn did not mention the find in any of his writings after 1925. By 1927 ''Science'' magazine had published a formal retraction of the original claim.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Gregory|first=W.K. |year=1927 |title=''Hesperopithecus'' apparently not an ape nor a man |journal=Science |volume=66 |pages=579–81|issue=1720 }}</ref> 

And thus, the Nebraska Man was consigned to the reject bin of scientific history, along with the tens of thousands of other discarded [[Hypothesis|hypotheses]] that are a normal part of [[scientific]] progress.

Nebraska Man and [[Piltdown Man]] were still, unfortunately, taught in textbooks in the 50s and 60s.{{fact}}

== Resurrection ==
Seemingly out of nowhere, the story of Nebraska Man appears to have been first revived in 1979 by [[Duane Gish]] in a book published by Creation-Life Publishers called ''Evolution? The Fossils Say No!'', where Gish quipped "I believe this is a case in which a scientist made a man out of a pig and the pig made a monkey out of the scientist."<ref name="Gish">{{cite book|title=Evolution? The Fossils Say No!|author=Gish, Duane T|year=1979|publisher=San Diego: Creation-Life Publishers}}</ref>

The story was developed further in 1982 in the anti-Darwinist book ''The Neck of the Giraffe'' by [[Francis Hitching]]. Hitching raised the story of Nebraska Man in his review of the [[Scopes trial]].<ref name="Hitching">{{cite book|title=The Neck of the Giraffe|author=Hitching, Francis|year=1982|publisher=New Haven: Ticknor & Fields}}</ref> In the book Hitching claims that during the trial "...the ''Hesperopithecus'' tooth was proudly displayed as evidence that man had a long evolutionary past" (p. 211) and that "the trial that became a significant turning point in U.S. educational history...was steered towards its verdict by a pig's tooth" (p. 212). Both of these claims are [[deceit|false]]; court transcripts indicate that neither the tooth nor the concept of "Nebraska Man" was ever mentioned by either side during the Scopes Trial.<ref name="CEJ"></ref>

Since then, the tale can be found in just about every creationist resource, usually with inflated hyperbole and allegations of scandal and conspiracy: 

{{quotebox|Many authorities gave Osborn their support (for the discovery)... Then all the drawings of '''Hesperopithecus haroldcooki''... were hurriedly removed from evolutionary literature.<ref>{{cite web|title=The Nebraska Man Scandal|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030424101711/http://www.darwinismrefuted.com/origin_of_man_16.html }}</ref>}}

{{quotebox|But, what exactly was the scientific proof for Nebraska Man?  The answer is a tooth.  That's right; he found one tooth!  The top scientists of the world examined this tooth and appraised it as proof positive of a prehistoric race in America.  What a classic case of excessive imagination!... Years after the Scopes trial, the entire skeleton of the animal from which the initial tooth came was found.  As it turns out, the tooth upon which Nebraska Man was constructed belonged to an extinct species of pig... What an embarrassment to the scientific community and a noteworthy commentary on our human nature.  Needless to say, little publicity was given to the discovered error.  Surely, there is a lesson here for us concerning the reliability of so-called "expert testimony," which is so often used to manipulate and intimidate the layman.<ref>{{cite web|title=Nebraska Man Hoax|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100202070140/http://rdlindsey.com/flashfacts/Nebraska.html }}</ref>}}

While refuting all of the absurd claims made by creationists would take forever, as regards the above quote: there are only two scientists who ever took the idea seriously, the complete skeleton was unearthed just before the Scopes Trial started, and the retraction of the claim was both published in Science and mentioned on the front page of the New York Times in 1928.<ref name="CEJ"></ref> In fairness, that might indeed count as "little publicity" to a group of people who hesitate to read reputable sources for their information.

==References==
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