Don't be ridiculous. Of course it is.
Now, such an amazing claim ("a human is not a primate") requires some amazing evidence, so let's see what sort of documentation "Con X-Poser" provides, shall we? He cites:
Apes, like chimpanzees, may have been the ancestors of monkeys but not humans. See (1) Mastropaolo, Joseph. An objective ancestry test for fossil bones. The Physiologist 45 (4): 343, 2002. Abstract. (2) Mastropaolo, Joseph. An objective ancestry test for fossil bones. TJ, The In-Depth Journal of Creation 16(3): 84-88, 2002. (3) Krupa, Donna. Discovery Of The Oldest Human Ancestor Is (again) Called Into Question. Press release for An Objective Ancestry Test For Fossil Bones,by the American Physiological Society Intersociety Meeting, The Power of Comparative Physiology: Evolution, Integration, and Adaptation, August 24-28, 2002, San Diego, CA.
Wow, three whole citations. Looks impressive. Until you realize that they're all references to THE SAME PAPER BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
Let's look at them one at a time:
(1) Mastropaolo, Joseph. An objective ancestry test for fossil bones. The Physiologist 45 (4): 343, 2002. Abstract.
Okay, that's one. We'll examine it below. But note that although "The Physiologist" is a respectable publication, it's not a peer-reviewed journal. Nor is it a journal that actually publishes any research papers at all. According to its website, it's just a "newsletter" that includes "articles on [American Physiology] Society affairs and announcements", and "abstracts of volunteered papers submitted for the APS conferences". It is *not* a science journal by any means, it's a newsletter of bulletins and announcements. Note also the #1 citation admits that only the "Abstract" (summary) of Mastropaolo's paper was published in the newsletter. Big whoop-de-do. The Psysiologist is archived online, here's the section which contains the cited summary (opens as a PDF file). And again, it's just there to let people know that the paper will be presented at the upcoming conference (and as one who has given papers at various petroleum conferences, I can attest that conferences don't bother checking whether your paper is nonsense or not, they're just happy to fill their schedule).
But now let's look at citation #2:
(2) Mastropaolo, Joseph. An objective ancestry test for fossil bones. TJ, The In-Depth Journal of Creation 16(3): 84-88, 2002.
Um, exsqueeze me, that's the same author and same title. Is there any reason you chose to list it twice, as if that gave it twice as much credibility? And although this appears to be a citation for the paper itself (but probably isn't, see below), note that it's not in a respected peer-reviewed science journal, it's in a creationist rag, which specifically requires submissions to be "dedicated to upholding the authority of the 66 books of the Bible, especially in the area of origins". And rather than objectively following the evidence where it leads, its editors are required to subscribe to a Statment of Faith" which includes, among other things, the statement that "The scientific aspects of creation are important, but are secondary in importance to the proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ". Oh, yeah, *there's* an objective journal...
Also from the "Instructions to potential TJ Authors" page for that publication is this gem: "Be careful of too many big or extra words". Uh huh...
Finally, as you can see on this overview of the contents of that issue of the creationist publication, Mastropaolo's work was published as only "Research Notes", not as a "Paper". So it appears that Mastropaolo's actual data or methods DON'T EVEN APPEAR IN PUBLISHED FORM where they can be double-checked by anyone. Typical creationist "pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, just take my word for it."
Now let's look at citation #3:
(3) Krupa, Donna. Discovery Of The Oldest Human Ancestor Is (again) Called Into Question. Press release for An Objective Ancestry Test For Fossil Bones,by the American Physiological Society Intersociety Meeting, The Power of Comparative Physiology: Evolution, Integration, and Adaptation, August 24-28, 2002, San Diego, CA
This is *AGAIN* a citation to the *same* paper by Mastropaolo, although by erroneously listing "Donna Krupa" it tries to make it look like the work of a different author. So how did Donna Krupa get dragged into this? Answer is here -- she was just the contact at the APS conference who was coordinating the speakers who would be appearing. How in the HELL did she end up being cited as an author, then? Note, by the way, that that link mentions Mastropaolo's paper, so this is clearly the same conference, and the SAME work described in citations #1 and #2.
If the creationists are this sloppy about their simple citations, how can we trust them with the hard stuff?
So what we have are three different references to the SAME work, presented as if they were three independent research findings (*NOT* very honest), and the work itself is not even published in full IN ANY OF THEM. #1 is a summary, #2 is "notes", #3 is an oral presentation at a conference.
So WHERE on earth is the actual paper?
I'm glad you asked...
Newswise.com maintains an archive of "news releases from top institutions engaged in scientific, medical, liberal arts and business research". Normally, you can download released (but not necessarily published) papers from there. The only direct link anywhere on the web I could find to Mastropaolo's paper appears on this Newswise page. So what happens when you click on the link to read the paper submitted to the conference? You get this:
American Physiological Society (APS)Doesn't exactly inspire confidence, does it?
27-Aug-02
Library: SCI
This story has been withdrawn at the request of the contributor.
Keywords: FOSSILS JOSEPH MASTROPAOLO
The only semi-detailed info I could find on this work was here, and the passage on Mastropaolo's "methods" sounded like complete gobbledegook:
For each bone, for each decile proximal to distal, all the lateral distances were tabulated in order followed by all the medial distances. These scores determined the correlational r, the mathematical magnitude of the similarity expressed from 0.0, no similarity, to 1.0, perfect in similarity. This test was validated by determining the correlation of the bone with itself at a different magnification. This test should be independent of image magnification and the correlation should approach 1.0.Basically, he measured some bones, but the methods and calculations appear to be, shall we say, questionable at best -- and at worst nonsensical. Furthermore, note that he didn't even examine the bones directly, he was working off of *PICTURE* of the fossil bone, and PICTURES of human/chimp/monkey bones in "anthropological atlases". FOR PETE'S SAKE... This would get laughed out of any respectable science journal, but it's par for the course for creationists.This test also was affirmed by identifying the correlation of the same bone in two different anthropological atlases. Given atlases with perfect fidelity, this test ought to be independent of the atlas employed and the correlation ought to approach 1.0. The criterion for similarity was that correlations exceed the correlation between the phalanx 1 toe bone and its anatomical neighbor, the phalanx 2 toe bone. A correlation equal to or less than that was considered as dissimilar as a bone for an anatomically neighboring bone. A correlation equal to or less than the one between the phalanx 1 and phalanx 3 toe bones was considered as grossly dissimilar as a bone for an anatomical neighbor two bones away.
Nor, I'm afraid to say, similar or disimilar sizes demonstrate the assertion Con X-poser makes above, that "man is not a primate" -- especially since the measurements were done only *on* primate bones of various types. Even if man was found to be more dissimilar to one primate bone or another, without making any comparisons *outside* the primate family, it can in no way determine whether man is closer to [name some other family] than to the primate family, or whether he's simply an unusual kind of primate (which we already knew).
Sheesh, Con X-poser, is this the best you can do?