Talk:Eugene M. McCarthy

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A further problem with McCarthy's hypothesis is that the documentation of successful crosses are always within biological orders

>>>This section relates to the sentence quoted in the heading above (i.e., "A further problem with McCarthy's hypothesis is that the documentation of successful crosses are always within biological orders"). It also relates to the section that immediately follows that sentence. Looking at the record for the Eugene M. McCarthy page, it seems Bongolian was the author of this statement (please correct if I'm wrong).

I'll start by saying flat out that this statement about crosses between orders is an old wives' tale, that is, it's something you often hear repeated (at least you do if you're someone like me, who spends much of his time reading about hybridization), but that upon examination turns out to have no basis in fact. I have spent much of my life documenting hybrid crosses, both avian crosses and mammalian, my two main areas of interest within the field of hybridization. When you document a cross you assemble as many reports as you can that state that the cross has occurred. It's inherent in the nature of such reports that some are more reliable than others. For example, for some types of crosses you have multiple studies investigating every imaginable aspect of the cross (principal component analysis of morphological traits, genetic analysis, production of the hybrids under controlled conditions, behavioral studies, field studies, audio/visual recordings, mapping of hybrid zones, etc., etc.). In others, you might have nothing more than a brief mention, on an obscure birder site, of some briefly sighted bird, or even just a picture in an old newspaper. But all of these different types of reports are the sort of thing you have to collect if you're trying to document a cross. Obviously, the evidence for a cross is best when multiple reports and multiple lines of evidence consistently support the idea that the cross occurs. But the process of documentation begins with the first report that you find. You record it under the heading of the cross, and then you look for others, compiling as you go.

For crosses that are not surprising, that is, ones between closely related parents, a cross will gain acceptance even on the basis of the flimsiest evidence. For example, in one study of the frequency of hybridization in different avian families, a team of researchers simply counted up the number of crosses that I listed for each family in my book (Handbook of Avian Hybrids of the World, Oxford University Press, 2006). So those researchers gave those very poorly attested close crosses equal credence with those documented by dozens of reports. So poorly documented close crosses are often much more readily believed, than other crosses like, say turkey x chicken, that are attested many separate reports. People are ready to accept in these poorly documented close crosses, I think, simply because they fit with what they already believe.

On the other hand, the less closely related the parents are in a cross, the less willing people are to accept that it occurs. And once the distance gets to a certain level, for some people at least, almost no amount of evidence will suffice. But as far as documentation goes, there are many reports about successful crosses between biological orders, and some of those crosses are far better documented than certain others that involve crosses within a single genus. So it simply isn't true that "the documentation of successful crosses are always within biological orders." (By the way, shouldn't that be are instead of is? It doesn't make a lot of sense to say the documentation are.)

But perhaps what Bongolian really intended to say was that "Crosses between different biological orders are not known to occur." If that was in fact his or her intent, then I might point out that they are not known not to occur either, and I would say further that there is, in the case of certain such crosses, a huge amount of evidence consistent with the idea that they do. So in the present case, it isn't reasonable for Bongolian to use an argument of the form "Events of type X never occur, so this particular event of type X is impossible." It hasn't been established that interordinal crosses never occur (indeed, as I say, there is a great deal of evidence that they do). So by claiming that "documentation of successful crosses are always within biological orders" Bongolian is saying something that he or she cannot possibly know, at least not without citing some known phenomenon that precludes its possibility. In my experience it's never a good idea, or even strictly ethical, to pretend that the unknown is known. In such cases, I think it's much better to reserve judgment, and never to say always.

You have made what is widely considered among biologists to be an extraordinary hypothesis, one that defies both lay and expert observation. The burden of proof is upon you, because you made the extraordinary hypothesis, to find a single case that shows viable offspring from inter-order mating. You need to show that the simplest explanation, natural selection as the predominant force of evolution and speciation, is incorrect. Bongolian (talk) 23:07, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

You know, if you had just posited your hypothesis in a more plausible way rather than a sensationalistic sort of way, you wouldn't be stretching so many sane people's eyeballs and baiting so many kooks (e.g., Infowars). If you had just said something like ancient humans and apes could have had offspring that contributed to modern humans, no one would think it so unreasonable. As it is your hypothesis rests on one thing that is unfalsifiable (genetic history for inter-order genetic contribution) and another for which there is no evidence, despite many people looking for many years for something that would be quite sensational (modern-day inter-order offspring). Your hypothesis fails a basic plausibility test. Bongolian (talk) 01:08, 15 July 2017 (UTC)

Come on, Bongolian! Aren't you just expressing your prejudices here? What do you really know about the phenomenon of hybridization? Do you have any expertise whatsoever? Have you ever read even a single primary report about a hybrid cross? Or are you just repeating a lot of stuff that you've heard but of which you have no real knowledge? Are you even a biologist? In the stuff that you just added to the Eugene M. McCarthy page you repeatedly cite me as a competent authority for things that you want to say about hybridization, and then, at the same time, you try to tear down my reputation. Which is it? Am I a leading authority in the field? Or am I just some ludicrous loon? It seems to me that you can't have it both ways. Isn't your behavior here actually a lot like the creationist modus operandi, that is, aren't you sticking with a strongly held belief (in your case the belief that interordinal hybrids never happen) despite the existence of huge amounts of documented evidence to the contrary? It's odd, but it seems there's something about hybridization that leads people who are otherwise rational and scientific to shudder and pull down the flaps. Perhaps that's what's happening in your case? I've seen this behavior even in some of the people who are strong supporters of my theories. For instance, one such, a Belgian biologist with whom I regularly correspond, and who is extremely enthusiastic about my work, lately mentioned that "he had a hard time bringing himself to look" at some of the hybrids on my site. This is obviously a gut reaction since on a logical level he finds no fault with my work. But if even he, a supporter, reacts in this way, how much more visceral must be the reactions of my intellectual opponents? So my advice to you, if you are in earnest about being scientific with regard to these issues (I give you the benefit of the doubt in that regard), is to look at the claims you're making and to consider whether they are 1) logical and evidence-based or 2) irrational and based on emotion and/or prejudice. Anyway, that's all for now. It's Saturday. (But I will try to get back to you soon with responses to the various specific claims you made in your last couple of posts.) 162.197.60.142 (talk) 14:50, 15 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

Now for some more details about the problems with your comments (as promised):

1)-- {{ping|Christopher}} You have made what is widely considered among biologists to be an extraordinary hypothesis, one that defies both lay and expert observation. There are three problems with this sentence of yours (a, b and c in what follows): (a) Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think anyone "makes" a hypothesis (as you phrase it). You make a claim. You invent, create, or think of, or consider a hypothesis. But you don't make one. So it seems this is yet another attempt on your part to misrepresent me, that is, to say that I'm making a definite claim. All I've ever said about this is that the facts are puzzling and that I think the matter should be investigated further; (b) No hypothesis is extraordinary. A hypothesis is either consistent or inconsistent with available data. But it is not extraordinary. The hypothesis that the moon is made of green cheese is inconsistent with available data, but it's not extraordinary, in fact its kind of a cliche; (c) Can a hypothesis "defy" anything? It seems to me that defiance is something only a conscious entity can engage in. But perhaps you mean to say that it's a hypothesis that is inconsistent with both lay and expert observation? If so, that's just plain wrong. Because we know about the observations that ordinary people make, and that scholars make, only through the reports that they make about those observations. And on my website I quote hundreds of reports describing interordinal, and in some cases even interclass, crosses, that are all from either ordinary people or from scholars. I can refer you to the specific pages where these quoted reports appear, but it would take up a lot of space because there are so many of them (your choice). 162.197.60.142 (talk) 20:28, 17 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

2)-- {{ping|Christopher}} "The burden of proof is upon you, because you made the extraordinary hypothesis, to find a single case that shows viable offspring from inter-order mating." (a) There you go, talking about "making" hypotheses again. As I said in the previous paragraph, it really doesn't make sense to talk about making hypotheses. You make claims. (b) What I've noticed that you do a lot, Bongolian, is that you set up a lot of straw men. A whole army of them in fact. Perhaps your strategy is simply to suffocate me by burying me in hay? The sentence I've just quoted is an example. I have never claimed that I have proved anything with regard to the pig-chimp hypothesis. I have merely considered the pig-chimp hypothesis by examining whether it is consistent with available data. But you erect a straw man here by suggesting that I claim to have proved something. And, of course, once you get your reader convinced that I have made a claim of that sort, it's easy to shoot me down, because making such a claim would be ridiculous. (That's the whole, underhanded idea with a straw man.) So you're cheating here, as is anyone who sets up a straw man, because you're telling a lie. After all, the definition of a straw man is "an intentionally misrepresented proposition that is set up because it is easier to defeat than an opponent's real argument." I'm beginning to think you're P.Z. Myers because that's what he does all the time (i.e., he misrepresents people he disagrees with so that he can seem to win arguments that he would otherwise obviously lose). Are you P.Z. Myers? If not, you're behaving like him. (c) On my website I have not documented "a single case that shows viable offspring from inter-order mating." I have documented hundreds, that is, in each case I quote the report and I provide its source. True, many of those hundreds refer to inviable hybrids, but a large fraction of them do refer to ones that are. 162.197.60.142 (talk) 20:28, 17 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

3)-- {{ping|Christopher}} You need to show that the simplest explanation, natural selection as the predominant force of evolution and speciation, is incorrect. This comment seems out of place. I thought we were talking about the pig-chimp hypothesis. But now you're talking about "the predominant force of evolution and speciation." So here you seem to be suddenly branching out in an attempt to discuss the general forces behind "evolution and speciation." Since it's so off-topic I'm going to just assume you misspoke and move on. (I will, however, be happy to discuss the general forces behind evolution with you later in a more appropriate context.)

4)-- {{ping|Christopher}} You know, if you had just posited your hypothesis in a more plausible way rather than a sensationalistic sort of way, you wouldn't be stretching so many sane people's eyeballs and baiting so many kooks (e.g., Infowars). (a) There is nothing that is plausible or implausible except in the light of evidence. I have explained, at length, why the pig-chimp hypothesis is more consistent with observation than is the standard hypothesis (gradual divergence of the human and ape lineages from a common ancestor). That is really all a scientist can do. Almost any hypothesis you can name, someone somewhere will think it's implausible. Are you saying I should guide my writings by what you consider to be plausible? That would be silly. What guides me when I write is curiosity and a compulsion to make everything factually accurate. I can't really worry about what you believe, or what anyone else believes. In fact, as I think I've said somewhere on this now lengthy page, I don't see any place for belief in science. (b) As to your suggestion that the hypothesis is sensationalistic, if you think that I created it, analysed it and published my results in order to gain attention, you're simply wrong. I created it just because it occurred to me, many years ago, that we might be hybrids (this thought occurred to me after I read Darwin's chapter on hybridism in the Origin of Species), and then, when I used the usual method used for identifying the parents of a putative hybrid of unknown origins, that method pointed toward chimpanzee and pig. The more I investigated, the more things pointed that way. I wrote up my findings because that's what I do when I investigate any complicated topic that requires careful documentation and argumentation. I went to graduate school so that I could understand the genetic data bearing on the hypothesis, and I passed my evolving manuscript to various geneticist colleagues. I started writing the manuscript in about 1984 and published nothing until 2013, when I finally made it available on my website. But even then, my motive was only to share with my fellow human beings the results of my decades of research, because I'm getting older now and have reached an age where I might just die at any moment, and because it seemed to me, and it still seems to me, that this line of research may be able eventually to draw back the ancient veil that has been cast over our origins. (c) Exactly who are these "many sane people" whose eyeballs I'm supposed to be stretching (citations please!). So far as I know there are exactly three biologist bloggers who have come out in opposition to the pig-chimp hypothesis, and one of those (Henry Gee's) was mostly amusing fluff with virtually no substantive content. Who are these phantom sane ones? (d) Likewise, who are you referring to when you say "so many kooks" (again citations please)? You mention "Infowars" and "YourNewsWire," but is that "so many"? How can anything be in the news and not be mentioned by at least a few kooks? And since I had never even heard of "Infowars" and "YourNewsWire" until you cited them, how can I have been baiting them? (To tell the truth, I'm not even sure what you mean by "baiting" in this context.) (e) And why do you refer to "sane"? Is it because Mark Twain was right? ("The rule is perfect: In all matters of opinion, our adversaries are insane.") I have to go do an errand now, but soon I'll be back to continue going through your comments (which I plan to do in the same sequence in which you made them). Till then, have a nice day. 162.197.60.142 (talk) 20:28, 17 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

Just because I accept that you have expertise in genetics and hybridization does not mean that I have to accept everything you have to say about hybridization and evolution. Linus Pauling was an Nobel Prize-winning expert in chemistry and quantum mechanics, but he was seriously wrong about orthomolecular medicine. I have no problem accepting the existence of hybrids and I am not repulsed by the idea that inter-species sex happens naturally, so I don't know why you need to insinuate that. You like to cite experts who support your work, e.g. your "Belgian biologist" above, but are there any geneticists or evolutionary biologists who support your ideas who are not anonymous? I did not call you a loon or a kook, I just said that what you are putting forth is baiting kooks like Infowars. Can you confirm whether these quotes attributed to you that were in the Times of India (cited by Infowars) are accurate?[1]

“”We believe that humans are related to chimpanzees because humans share so many traits with chimpanzees. Is it not rational then also, if pigs have all the traits that distinguish humans from other primates, to suppose that humans are also related to pigs? Let us take it as our hypothesis, then, that humans are the product of ancient hybridization between pig and chimpanzee.

“”Serious efforts are now underway to transplant kidneys and other organs from pigs into human beings. Why are pigs suited for such purposes? Why not goats, dogs, or bears - animals that, in terms of taxonomic classification, are no more distantly related to human beings than pigs?

Bongolian (talk) 01:06, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

Copying a comment I made on Bongolian's talk page here:

You appear to claim it on this page where there is a blue box entitled "the theory in a nutshell", I'll copy it here:

The theory in a nutshell:

Specifically, I suggest that the facts we have from observation best fit the supposition that a chimpanzee- or bonobo-like animal anciently crossed with a pig to produce an offspring that then mated back ("backcrossed") to a chimpanzee. The theory then posits that further backcrossing to chimpanzee occurred in subsequent generations, so that the amount of pig in the descendant hybrids was greatly diluted so that they became much more like chimpanzees than pigs. However, as might be expected, certain traces of pig would remain. Humans, it proposes, emerged from the resulting highly variable hybrid population.

You use "theory" (as a scientist discussing biology, it's fairly obvious which definition of theory you mean) and say "the facts we have from observation best fit the supposition that [pigs + apes mating etc]." Although you do also use "supposition" to describe the pig/ape stuff in the quoted text. Christopher (talk) 18:54, 18 July 2017 (UTC)

@ChristopherWhen I say "the facts we have from observation best fit," all I mean is that those facts are more consistent with that hypothesis. However, mere consistency, as any scientist knows, is not proof. So even here I'm not claiming it's correct. As I keep saying, it's all hypothetical. Moreover, if I somehow seem to imply something else, that is, that it is factually true, then I don't mean to and I would try to edit out any phrasing that seems to imply such a conclusion. Perhaps the use of the word theory here causes some people to jump to the conclusion that I mean theory in the sense of "a belief or policy proposed as a basis of action" (here I'm quoting from my dictionary, but I really mean it simply in the sense of hypothesis, conjecture, supposition, or speculation (also from my dictionary). I've run into issues generated by the ambiguous meaning of theory before. But please be assured that I use it here only in the latter sense. Maybe I should go through the whole pig-chimp discussion on my site and replace theory with hypothesis wherever it occurs? However, with my repeated statements to the effect that I am only considering a hypothesis and not asserting that the pig-chimp scenario is proven, I think, I should get me a little slack here. I suppose one problem I have is that it's so patently obvious to me that I haven't proven anything, that it's difficult for me to imagine that anyone would think that I thought that I had. I was after all, a math major as an undergraduate, so I do know something about proofs. (162.197.60.142 (talk) 20:32, 18 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

@ChristopherMoreover, I went and looked at the page that that quote was taken from and I'll bet that Bongolian didn't tell you that right beside that quote (which is in a sidebar) it says this: "But, Dr. Prothero, I do not claim "that humans are formed by hybridizing apes and pigs.” Here, you misrepresent me. I merely offer a theory that explains our origins in that way." (The emphasis appeared in the same way in the original.) I think this puts what I'm saying beyond doubt, though I think I may, nonetheless, go back to that page on my site and remove the ambiguities from the sentence Bongolian quoted to you (because I do always try to be as clear as possible). So doesn't it seem that Bongolian is just misrepresenting me again, this time by quoting me out of context (in addition to misinterpreting my intended meaning due to an ambiguity, as I said before)? 162.197.60.142 (talk) 22:06, 18 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

Bongolian's new section about Bedford's research

Bongolian, this section relates to the new statements you inserted about human sperm not being able to attach to the zonae pellucidae (ZPs) of non-hominoids based on Bedford (1977).

It's true that human sperm will bind to ape ZPs, as evidenced by, say, Lanzendorf et al. (1992) who reported that under experimental conditions human sperm succeeded in penetrating gorilla ova. (The resulting zygotes were not allowed to develop.) In their study, gorilla sperm bound human zonae pellucidae (ZPs), and human sperm bound gorilla ZPs. Work cited: Lanzendorf, S. E., W. J. Holmgren, D. E. Johnson, M. J. Scobey, Jeyendran, R. S. 1992. Hemizona assay for measuring zona binding in the lowland gorilla. Mol. Reprod. Dev. 31:264-267.

However, if you're trying to claim on the basis of Bedford's old study that human spermatozoa fail to attach to the zona pellucida of all non-hominoid oocytes (that is, of all animals other than apes), then you're incorrect. More recent studies have shown that simply isn't true. For example, the following is copied and pasted from the section entitled "Human Sperm Are Able to Bind to Pig ZP and Undergo the AR" in Canovas et al. (2007), who state, and I quote, "The results shown in this work indicate that human spermatozoa can bind tightly to the ZP from in vitro matured pig oocytes. Besides, the induction of the human AR when human sperm were incubated with pig oocytes for 2.5 hours indicated that the binding was active and it led to AR." (AR stands for acrosome reaction. The acrosome reaction is the process by which a spermatozoon penetrates an ovum.) Pigs are not the only non-hominoids to whose ZPs human sperm will bind, however, in the present context, they seem to constitute the most germane example.

Christopher, you're letting Bongolian go on adding erroneous and misleading information to this page (as I've just documented), even while you prohibit me from making corrections. Wouldn't it make sense, and be more fair, to simply have a moratorium on further changes until the many issues I've raised get properly resolved? Otherwise, the problems could easily mushroom with time. My silence, to date, on certain of his/her claims does not necessarily mean that I think them correct. Rather, with regard to most of what he says, I just haven't had time to muster a thorough, documented response. If he's simply allowed to just go on and on like this, making additions, I'll never have a chance to catch up, because it's much easier to make poorly researched, undocumented and erroneous statements than it is to carefully document that they are wrong. So, then, what do you think? Would a moratorium be the reasonable way to go?

162.197.60.142 (talk) 15:16, 19 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy @Christopher@Bongolian

I am deleting the Bedford paragraph as per your newer reference. Thank you for clarifying. Bongolian (talk) 03:08, 20 July 2017 (UTC)

Thank you, Bongolian. I appreciate your efforts to be honest here. However, and I don't mean this to be insulting, your account of me and my ideas is still riddled with inaccuracies and misrepresentations. Perhaps, this is simply because you don't have the time to check things out carefully and not because you have some sort of vendetta against me. I don't know you so I can't say. However, I will point out that you are not following even the prominent instructions displayed by RationalWiki at the top of this page, to wit: "Articles about living people must be handled carefully, because they are more open to legal threats. Reference any contentious allegations solidly; unreferenced allegations should be removed." I can help you with eliminating unreferenced or inproperly referenced allegations, but only if you read what I say, think about it, and respond to it. One thing I'd like you to think about is that there is a big difference between (1) considering hypotheses (that is, between considering imaginary suppositions) and, (2) making claims (e.g., saying you know, saying you believe, or saying you've proved something). It seems to me that the former is the essence of science, the latter, that of religion.162.197.60.142 (talk) 15:28, 20 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy @Christopher@Bongolian

Latin ducks

• goldeneye (Bucephala clangula) × hooded merganser (Bucephala clangula)

Something not quite right here. Will try to fix when I have more time. - Smerdis of Tlön, ^{LOAD "*", 8, 1.} 22:18, 18 July 2017 (UTC)

@Smerdis of Tlön Hooded merganser is Lophodytes cucullatus not Bucephala clangula (that was a typo in the Powerpoint presentation from which that cross was copied and pasted).162.197.60.142 (talk) 22:29, 18 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

Pages incorrectly cited by Bongolian

Of the five pages listing crosses reported for specific mammalian families (cited by Bongolian), four document interordinal crosses (i.e., those for families Suidae, Bovidae, Camelidae and Cervidae). Thus, they are not appropriate sources to site for his claim, "that the documentation of successful crosses are always within biological orders." Also, isn't it a little ironic that he's citing those pages, since I compiled them, given that he seems to be working so assiduously to discredit me? Why cite me? Why not cite someone he trusts? 162.197.60.142 (talk) 17:38, 19 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy @Christopher@Bongolian

I have made some corrections based on your comment above. I'm not trying to smear you, but I am trying to not accept your hypothesis uncritically. Bongolian (talk) 04:22, 20 July 2017 (UTC)

In response to "I'm not trying to smear you, but I am trying to not accept your hypothesis uncritically.": Perhaps you don't intend to smear me, but simply by including me with all of the dingdongs listed on RationalWiki, you do. I can only think that you're serving some higher purpose in being mean to me in this way. As to your accepting the hypothesis, I'm not asking you to do that. Even I don't accept it. I merely investigate it and write about it (and try to improve it). To me, as soon as someone starts accepting things (=believing things), they've moved from the realm of science to that of religion.

In response to "I have made some corrections based on your comment above.": In reading the changes that you made, in particular your talking about my listings of interordinal crosses being "based on unreliable unscientific reports," it occurred to me, Bongolian, that you probably don't understand the methods I follow in documenting hybrid crosses. Maybe it would be helpful if I explain. You seem to imagine that definite knowledge about a given hybrid cross can be quickly gained by doing some experiment or by asking some authority. But in reality, for many crosses, there has been no experimentation and the authority (say, Gene McCarthy) doesn't know whether it has occurred. So what you're left with is a long grind of collecting information wherever you can. With enough investigation such questions are sometimes answered, but much remains unknown.

So, then, as to my methods, on many pages of the website, especially those pages covering a controversial cross (which, in general, is usually one that's more distant than what most biologists think is possible), I always try to include a prominent notice that reads: "In listing reports of hybrids, it has been my policy to include all serious allegations, especially those of scholars, whether or not the hybrid alleged seems possible or likely to me. This policy, I think, helps to eliminate subjective judgment on my part, and therefore should remove at least one source of systematic bias from my work. It also helps to fulfill the ethical obligation of telling not just the truth, but the whole truth." I have adopted this policy because, over the last thirty years, during the course of my research into hybrids, I have run across many reports about hybrids between extremely distantly related parents. Being aware of these reports, I had to make a decision how to handle them. I might have simply not mentioned them (this was the policy of most earlier compilers of information about hybrids). But it seemed to me it would be dishonest to just sweep it all under the rug. Most people are unaware that such reports are numerous, so it would be tantamount to deception to say nothing and let them go on believing that was the case.

So the method that I have followed has been, whenever I first find a report about some new type of hybrid cross that I haven't heard about, to create a heading for that cross. The heading goes into the section for whatever taxonomic family is appropriate. Then I quote, or at least cite, that report under that heading. I also try to include under that heading any other relevant information bearing on that particular type of cross, such as whether the parents involved occur in the same geographic regions or whether they have been observed mating (there are often youtube videos documenting this). In short, the heading becomes a dumping ground for any information I happen to find that seems relevant to that particular type of cross. For some crosses, an example is dog x rabbit, I've found only a single report, even though I've searched for thirty years. For others, an example is human x cow, I've found so many separate reports that I really have no idea anymore how many I've quoted. Indeed, just by my recording reports on the human x cow page, it has become one of the largest pages on my site. One of the ideas behind making such compilations is to allow readers to make a better-informed judgment about whether any given type of cross occurs.

But, while some of these crosses, such as human x cow, are attested by a large number of reports, I try always to withhold judgment on whether they actually occur until certain criteria are met. For example, a report that a hybrid has been produced by two parents kept alone together in constant, close confinement, as in a cage at a zoo, is convincing proof that the hybrid in question actually has occurred. Sometimes the parentage of a hybrid is obvious because one part of its body is identical to one of its parents while another is identical to the other. There is also genetic testing. Of course, even these absolutely reliable methods of identification are only as reliable as the person doing the reporting. Hoaxes can still occur. So in some sense, you can never totally accept that any hybrid cross occurs. You have to keep in mind that there is always the possibility of a mistake or a trick. But in general, collecting the relevant information for a given cross under a single heading and documenting that information is the only rational way of pursuing the question of whether that cross occurs. Of course, one might simply choose not to pursue the question of whether interordinal crosses occur and dismiss all reports of such things simply because one believes such things are impossible. But my policy has been to reserve judgment as much as possible and go on investigating.

The main thing I do to investigate, since I don't have a laboratory or a breeding facility, is to look up reports and compile them in the way that I've just described. That is, I document each cross by citing or quoting reports and providing their sources. So now, at last, I can explain the problem that I have with your sentence on the main page which reads, "A further problem with McCarthy's hypothesis is that the documentation of successful crosses would seem to be either within biological orders, or based on unreliable unscientific reports." To say the documentation is "based on unreliable unscientific reports" doesn't exactly make sense because the documentation is not based on reports, rather, the documentation for a cross is the reports that I collect about that cross. However, whether those reports are unreliable, whether they are unscientific, that's a judgment call, and it must be made with respect to each individual report. But one thing that's definitely true, is that it's an oversimplification to say that they are all unreliable and unscientific. Rather, to be accurate, one would have to say that some are much more reliable and/or scientific than others. And also, as with the occurrence any other type of event, the occurrence of hybrid births of a given type, becomes more reliable, more believable, as the number of independent eyewitness reports goes up. It's hard to understand, for example, how many people, living in many different places and during different eras, could give the same physical descriptions of a given type of hybrid, if they had not actually seen such hybrids. How would they coordinate their stories? In other words, if someone in Kansas in 1912 was fabricating a description of a hybrid, why would their description agree with that given by other people elsewhere, say someone living in Germany in 1828? It's puzzling. 162.197.60.142 (talk) 15:28, 20 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy @Christopher@Bongolian

I have a serious problem with your methodology. Uncritically documenting claims is not science. And as I've indicated before, this procedure is not helpful — it is harmful because it is fodder for kooks. Again, I'm not calling you a kook, but I think you may be enabling kooks by your stamp of authority. For comparison, lets look at how meta-analyses are performed: 1) Do a thorough literature search and document everything that is relevant to the study 2) Examine the quality of each of the studies: Was the scientific method used? Were there any serious deficiencies in a given study that would compromise the outcome (e.g. various biases or inadequacies)? 3) Remove the studies that do not meet basic criteria for inclusion, otherwise it's just garbage in garbage out and the meta-analysis itself becomes compromised. 4) Do the statistical analysis of the studies that meet the inclusion criteria. 5) Report results. Obviously, you're not trying to do a meta-analysis, but really you're only at stage 1. More problematically, you're mostly collecting anecdotes because most of these alleged hybrids have not been personally examined by biologists.

You say above that you "try always to withhold judgment on whether they actually occur", but in fact you do judge, and it sometimes looks loony to a biologist. For example on your "Human Hybrids" page, [2] your figure on reliability of hybridization is quite eye-widening because it does not follow known genetic proximity as per the genetically-constructed tree of life: human × pig, cow, goat, sheep, dog, horse and chicken hybrids are more reliable than human × orangutan and chimpanzee hybrids. Really!?? How do you expect to be taken seriously by reporting a figure like this? You don't even appear to describe how you came to this conclusion. Is it more anecdotes = more reliability? That's not science. Bongolian (talk) 05:06, 21 July 2017 (UTC)

My responses to your comments, sentence by sentence:

First let me say that I would have responded sooner, but a massive pine tree crushed the back of our house over the weekend. It's been keeping me occupied.

Uncritically documenting claims is not science. How can you "critically document" anything? With documentation, you provide information and say where you got that information (attribute it to a source). It's not a matter of being critical. My wife is a longtime journalist and she has always told me that if you attribute everything to sources, and don't distort what your sources say, then you yourself cannot be held at fault. This is because you have been entirely honest. And you are especially safe from criticism if you quote (accurately) a source. Then there is absolutely no wiggle room where someone might say that you are misrepresenting the source's statements. If you're up front in each case about exactly who the source is, then the reader can make his or her own judgment about whether to trust that source. So my goal is to be honest and accurate about everything. You seem to be suggesting that I should simply omit certain reports. Is that correct? If so, I don't see myself as a censor. I see my role as collecting, categorizing, quoting, and accurately sourcing reports, in short, to accurately report what's been reported about each type of cross. I try to keep my own opinions to a minimum. So I don't see why you say such things aren't science. To me science is a process where you seek the truth and must therefore speak the truth. That's all I've done. (More later--As I say, I'm dealing with that tree that fell on my house.)162.197.60.142 (talk) 14:19, 24 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

And as I've indicated before, this procedure is not helpful — it is harmful because it is fodder for kooks. Again, I'm not calling you a kook, but I think you may be enabling kooks by your stamp of authority. To me, it's like you're saying that trying to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth isn't helpful. Because that's what my method is intended to achieve. How is that unhelpful? As to kooks, obviously, any statement you make, whether it's true or not, a kook can potentially make kooky uses of it. But rational people can make good use of truthful, reliable, documented statements as well. Really, I think your expectations are unreasonable. As Karl Popper once said, "It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood." 162.197.60.142 (talk) 18:38, 26 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

For comparison, lets look at how meta-analyses are performed:....Obviously, you're not trying to do a meta-analysis, but really you're only at stage 1. I think you've said it all here, that is that I'm not trying to do a meta-analysis. I don't even reach any conclusions, as they do in a meta-analysis. I merely offer a hypothesis. To my mind I'm like the English physician Archibald Garrod, who in 1909 proposed the one-gene, one-enzyme hypothesis. He didn't say it was true, he just proposed it as an explanation of how genes work (just as I've proposed an explanation of how humans came into being). He not only never demonstrated that his hypothesis was correct, but even died before it was accepted. So yes, I agree, as you say, I am "only at stage 1." But I haven't claimed to be at stage 2. And, as for all the stuff about distant crosses in general, as I see it, collecting all the reports on avian and mammalian hybridization into one place, and categorizing it all under the heading of each cross type, is a service. People, including scientists, are in general so ignorant and so biased with regard to the phenomenon of hybridization that most scarcely know anything about it, and what they do think they know, is more often wrong than not. What you have, for the most part, is a lot of biased no-nothings who mock anyone that wants to make a serious effort at investigation. This is because there is a taboo attached to the topic. Talking about hybrids makes people uncomfortable, talking about bowel movements or sex does. And, most relevantly to the present debate, the huge levels of bias in connection with the possibility of distant hybrid crosses have suppressed nearly all experimentation on that topic, and even the collection of existing reports. People have a very fixed idea about what's possible and what's not, even though (1) scientists have carried out virtually no experiments to test the question of whether such crosses are possible (for example, attempts at such crosses via artificial insemination), and (2) in the few cases where they have, such crosses have been surprisingly successful. For instance, experiments involving the hybridization of distantly related fish, Newman (1915, 1917 and 1918) found that many interordinal crosses did produce viable hybrids.

Works cited: Newman, H. H. 1915. Development and heredity in heterogenic teleost hybrids. Journal of Experimental Zoology, 18: 511-576. http://tinyurl.com/q2t7g2n

Newman, H. H. 1917. On the production of monsters by hybridization. Biological Bulletin, 32: 306-321. http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdfplus/10.2307/1536313

Newman, H. H. 1918. Hybrids between Fundulus and Mackerel. Journal of Experimental Zoology, 26: 391-417.http://tinyurl.com/y9vur7vo

More problematically, you're mostly collecting anecdotes because most of these alleged hybrids have not been personally examined by biologists. I believe you're misusing the word anecdote. As I've always understood it, in a scientific context, anecdote refers to such statements as "They say the Norway Rat came from Scandinavia." In other words, it refers to statements and stories that cite no specific witnesses and no specific observations. However, news reports (and I do not cite news reports exclusively, though I do cite many) are not anecdotes in that sense, because they are often eyewitness reports naming specific witnesses and stating specific facts. For example take the following news report about what seems to be a rather outlandish hybrid, which appeared on page 2, column 3, of the July 12, 1888, issue of the Springfield Daily Republic, a newspaper published in Springfield, Ohio (source):

Nature's Freak

Stoverton, July 12.—A most remarkable freak of nature is reported from the farm of George Sevingle, who lives near this place. He has among a flock of sheep a lamb over two months old, which has the nose and feet of a dog, but is in all other respects a sheep. Instead of having the ordinary teeth of the sheep kind, the animal's mouth, both upper and lower jaws, is filled with long and sharp wolf-like fangs, rendering it extremely difficult to pick grass like the other sheep. Consequently it prefers to chew and masticate twigs and shrubs. It is regarded as one of the greatest curiosities ever seen in this neighborhood.

Now here we have a local newspaper writing about a specific local individual, farmer George Sevingle, and giving a specific description of the animal ("a lamb over two months old, which has the nose and feet of a dog, but is in all other respects a sheep") that suggests that it must, if the description is not a hoax or mistake, be a dog-sheep hybrid. An alternative, but rather implausible, conclusion is to say that the editor of the paper simply made it all up and that he or she wasn't concerned about offending Mr. Sevingle (and other residents of the small town of Stoverton) by telling easily detectable lies about Mr. Sevingle. Another explanation is that by means of some mutation, complex morphological structures like a dog's nose and a dog's paws arose in the offspring of a sheep in a single generation, but this, again, seems highly unlikely, especially when it is a known fact that farm dogs frequently do mount ewes and copulate with them. This report is not the same as a DNA test, but it does raise questions, especially when it is read alongside the hundreds of other reports of a similar ilk that I have collected on my website.

I still haven't addressed all of your comments, but this is all I have time for today. More soon. 162.197.60.142 (talk) 18:38, 26 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

Let me say that I'm still calling for a moratorium on additions to this page. While I've noticed some improvements lately (thanks!), I've also noticed some new errors that have been added, even before I've had time to address existing errors. If that's the way the game is going to be played, I might as well suffer in silence. Trying to correct all the mistakes is like fighting a hydra, you chop off one head and two more grow back in its place. For instance, is it fair in the new section about Handbook of Avian Hybrids, when my book has received so many positive reviews, to pick out the most negative review (by far), the one by Graves, and then to pick out his most negative comments? Isn't that just totally biased? For instance what about the following blurbs about my book (copied and pasted from the Oxford U.P. Website)?

"For biologists interested in hybridization, for conservationists interested in particular species, for ornithologists interested in specific relationships, and for birdwatchers intent on evaluating plumages, this book is a goldmine."--Integrative and Comparative Biology

"Extremely useful reference ... essential reading for biologists interested in the evolution of birds."--Ibis

"Fine piece of work...a must for all those interested in hybridisation and speciation in birds."--Contributions to Zoology

"McCarthy...has done an admirable job... Anyone interested in avian hybridism will need the handbook...provides an excellent resource for serious birders and ornithologists." --Western Birds

"An invaluable addition to every biological reference library and to all ornithologists with the slightest potential interest in or need for avian hybrid information. "--The Emu

"The Handbook of Avian Hybrids is an impressive accomplishment, one that can be equally savored by browsing birders and appreciated by serious students of one of the biggest birding challenges out there. Highly recommended."-- Rick Wright, editor American Birding Association (birdaz.com)

"Exhaustive... The bibliography is a mammoth 150 [actually, 160] pages and lists over 5000 references! ... This book is an essential resource for banders, museum curators, and the serious birder. For researchers in conservation, ecology, and evolution, the book is a treasure trove of the occurrence and frequency of hybrids that could be used for preliminary comparative studies."--Journal of Field Ornithology

"There is a high level of accuracy for individual reports in addition to the extent of the overall survey; it seems to indeed come as close to a complete compilation as is humanly possible. I have not met Dr. McCarthy, but after reviewing innumerable cases, I have a vision of a monkish figure variously cloistered in the ancient stacks of academic libraries and hunched before a computer terminal, compiling case after case with detail and accuracy that would guarantee his deliverance to a state of (academic) grace! I am sure my vision is a bit exaggerated, but it is an amazing compilation."--William S. Moore, Professor of Biology, Wayne State University162.197.60.142 (talk) 18:38, 26 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘I'm sorry to hear about the tree falling on your house. I hope that no one was hurt.

I don't see how I was unfair about the book reviews. I specifically cited 3 enthusiastically favorable reviews. The negative review, which is not entirely negative, gets to the heart of the matter about what is wrong your methodological approach and what is wrong with your website, so it is quite germane to quote Graves and Graves alone from reviews. Although you mentioned that you had mixed peer reviews of your manuscript, On the Origins of New Forms of Life, you only quoted one of them on your website. Was that fair?

Your repeatedly stating "talking about hybrids makes people uncomfortable", is quite bizarre. It seems to be an argument from squeamishness, i.e., "You're too squeamish to look at the truth so don't look, and I'll explain it to you." I'm not squeamish, so just stop with this nonsense. Bongolian (talk) 19:31, 26 July 2017 (UTC)

"so it is quite germane to quote Graves and Graves alone from reviews"

No, because Graves misrepresents my work in the same way that you do, to wit, he pretends that I claim these various hybrids exist and are well confirmed, when I do not. In fact, in the case of Handbook of Avian Hybrids of the World, I discussed this very issue with my editors, that is, how to handle reports that are less than fully reliable, and it was agreed that I should not suppress information, but rather that I should try, for each cross where doubts existed, to inform the reader at least that doubts existed, and wherever possible, to add comments indicating why there were doubts. For example, in the abbreviation key for the book there is a line indicating that a question mark added to a cross account indicates doubt about the reliability of the report, and a double question mark indicates marked doubt. Some crosses based only on early dubious reports, include the comment "Old records." Many doubtful crosses were shoved into an appendix entitled "Dubious Reports." In short, using these and other methods, I attempted, as much as possible, to inform the reader about the quality of the documenting material. (And I use these same sorts of methods on my website.) Obviously, this approach has certain disadvantages. For example, when I list a particular type of cross, there will always be those who do not read carefully what I actually say and who will therefore misrepresent me (as you and Graves do) and who will turn around and say or imply (as you and Graves do) that I claim that the occurrence of a given cross is reliably established when I don't. But how can anyone write on this subject in such a way that they cannot be misrepresented in this way? Clearly, they can't. What is possible is to do your utmost to be honest, accurate, thorough and clear and to leave it at that. My editors and I agreed that, from a scientific standpoint, my method (listing all crosses reported, along with assessments of their reliability whenever there was reason for doubt) is preferable to the one that you seem to be suggesting (censoring all reports that were not totally reliable). The former of these two options is more honest and, from the standpoint of science, has proved to be more fruitful as well. For example, numerous studies have been prompted by those less than fully reliable listings that you and Graves deplore, and now, ten years later, some of those once dubious crosses have been confirmed or, at least, have been better studied. If I had not listed those crosses, it's entirely possible no one would have chosen to do such work.162.197.60.142 (talk) 13:54, 28 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

"I'm sorry to hear about the tree falling on your house. I hope that no one was hurt."

I must say this rings hollow, coming from someone who seems to spare no effort in trying to misrepresent me and drag down my reputation. I can't believe that you would act in the way that you do if you had genuine concerns for me and my family. It seems to me that this is just a blatant example of your systematically dishonest behavior. 162.197.60.142 (talk) 13:54, 28 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

"Although you mentioned that you had mixed peer reviews of your manuscript, On the Origins of New Forms of Life, you only quoted one of them on your website. Was that fair?"

Yes it was fair, because the points raised by the negative ones were nearly always to the effect that "McCarthy's theory supposes X, but X contradicts supposition Y of Darwin's theory, which most biologists accept. Hence supposition X must be wrong." Such objections are silly because it's obvious that any genuinely new theory will have to suppose things that preexisting theories did not. So why quote nonsense? Would that be somehow fair? 162.197.60.142 (talk) 15:40, 28 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

"Your repeatedly stating "talking about hybrids makes people uncomfortable", is quite bizarre. It seems to be an argument from squeamishness, i.e., 'You're too squeamish to look at the truth so don't look, and I'll explain it to you.' I'm not squeamish, so just stop with this nonsense."

Methinks you protest too much! 162.197.60.142 (talk) 15:48, 28 July 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

A Challenge for the RationalWiki Board (members, nominees and candidates):

Below, I've pinged the various members and prospective members of your board to let them know that nearly your entire page about me (Eugene M. McCarthy) is a fabric of undocumented claims, malicious innuendo, clumsy misrepresentation and/or outright lies, the creation of which seems to be driven by the personal biases of those who wrote it in what seems to be an effort to enforce their own personal opinions at the expense of the truth. I have been at a loss about what to do about these, my faceless detractors, who work unjustly and, seemingly, relentlessly to bring down my reputation. For I find that often, even when I do manage to convince those controlling the editing of the McCarthy page that some specific problem does in fact exist and see it removed, soon thereafter one or more new problematic statements spring up in its place. If I had nothing better to do, I could spend my entire life haggling with them about every little issue with this page, and daily watch error replaced with error. But I think it will be a lot less work simply to challenge the creators of the McCarthy page to pick any statement, or related group of statements, on that page and to set it forward in quotes as their champion representing the general quality and reliability of their claims on the page as a whole. I will then explain in a rational manner, using logic and evidence, why their statement(s) fail(s) to meet the ordinary standards of approved scientific discourse. If I can then convince you that this best and strongest representative of their efforts falls short, I would then ask you to remove the entire McCarthy page from your website (or, better yet, to replace it with a retraction and apology). If I fail to convince you, I won't trouble you further. I would only exclude the following three sentences, which, so far as I can see are entirely correct:

1. Eugene M. McCarthy earned a B.S. in mathematics, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in genetics, all from the University of Georgia.

2. His Master's thesis was on recombinational speciation, and Ph.D. thesis was on computational genomics.

3. The Handbook has received some enthusiastically positive academic reviews.

162.197.60.142 (talk) 12:59, 2 August 2017 (UTC)Gene McCarthy

@Christopher@NarkySawtooth@ClickerClock@Owlman@LeftyGreenMario@JorisEnter@Spud@ScepticWombat@Human@Ikanreed@Bicycle Wheel@Bongolian@DiamondDisc1@CheeseburgerFace

As a matter of policy, the board does not involve itself in any authoritative way with matters of editorial dispute. Board members are still allowed to be editors as any other member of the site, but our duties as maintainers of the website's continuity and stability is at an arms length from the site's content. We do not dictate article content, nor do we resolve disputes about article content. That is the extent of any official reply I'm going to offer as a board member.

As an editor, the amount of well referenced assertions in this article, and the missionality of claims of hybridization far beyond scientific consensus make this article an unlikely candidate for deletion. I'm going to turn your request around on you: please challenge specific unsourced or incorrectly sourced statements in the article. You don't necessarily need to establish every single thing you think is wrong, but at the moment, I have very little to go on besides your broad assertion that the article is a misrepresentation. ikanreed ^{🐐Bleat at me} 15:40, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

Dr. McCarthy, I can only see the article about you being deleted under the following circumstances. You would have to publicly reject the hypothesis you put forward that humans might be descended from a chimpanzee-pig hybrid. You would also have to remove your name from your whacky website about hybrids and run it anonymously in future. Spud (talk) 16:33, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

May I point out that you, Dr. McCarthy, pinged people that aren't running/declined their nomination?-⇂ɔsᴉᗡpuoɯɐᴉᗡ (talk) 17:12, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

You pinged me even though I declined nomination. Good manners do not allow me to say what kind of person does that, but you're one of those people. Bicycle^wheel 19:19, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

Good day, Dr. McCarthy. Is the chimpanzee-pig hybrid not something from your book? Also, do you not purport other hybrids such as a purple finch?—(((CheeseburgerFace)))  (talk • stalk) 19:33, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

I'm not the right person to ask. I really don't care about this subject and even if I'm a board member, I don't have the patience to slog through such a dreadful, drawn-out talk page and seeing this talk page spooping up in the recent changes every single freaking day. --It's-a me, LeftyGreenMario! 06:53, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

And IMO judging by length alone I wouldn't be surprised if other people pointed and laughed at this crap. --It's-a me, LeftyGreenMario! 06:54, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

Boardmember response

First: The RationalMedia Foundation (RMF) does not control content on RationalWiki.org (RW) except as it relates to [1] legal concerns or [2] keeping the site running.

Second: RW operates as an anarcho-communist mutualist-councilist government "mobocracy" in which the views of both elected moderators and trustees are valued exactly as little much as non-elected users (except in legal matters or during HCM). Please don't believe you can convince the "powers that be", as there are none. You can only appeal to the mob.

And as a regular user: Brownnosing don't look so good. FU22YC47P07470 (talk/stalk) 11:36, 3 August 2017 (UTC)