"Maybe his was a social promotion."
I'm sure common descent was not an issue that came up in his job interview. Why don't you petition medical and other scientific institutions to screen applicants by having them swear they affirm common descent? My friend couldn't possibly do his job without believing in common descent, right?
He also said he knew many others who share his view. I personally do not work in that field, so I do not know first hand.
Universal common descent is nonessential to any science. What consequences would there be of it being untrue?
Apparently there are more than a few fervent believers in universal common descent who elevate it to the level of causality or logic or mathematics. It is not just a tenet of their science, it is an axiom of it. It is the measure of all else.
Will they have a better sense of humor?
The 16S ribosomal phylogenetic tree would make no sense. Why, if we are descended from two separately created organisms, do all our ribosomes fall on a single phylogenetic tree?
Baby Fae
Bailey's use of baboons was somewhat surprising, given their relatively distant evolutionary relationship to humans compared to other primates. The reason came to light when the Times of London published an interview between Bailey and an Australian radio crew. The reporters had been forbidden to ask direct questions about the operation, so they queried Bailey on the issue of why he had chosen a baboon in view of the baboon's evolutionary distance from humans. Bailey replied, "Er, I find that difficult to answer. You see, I don't believe in evolution."6