Paul McCarthy's story about cryptozoologists (The Scientist, Jan. 11, 1993, page 1) left me wondering why these researchers are so scorned by other scientists and by funding agencies when evolutionary biologists engage in the same activity.
McCarthy noted that French zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans coined the term "cryptozoology" to describe the study of unverified animals. Of course, that's what evolutionists do when they speculate about undiscovered transitional fauna in the fossil record. Recently it has become fashionable to ascribe the absence of transitional forms to the sudden development of new species. Yet in The Origin of Species, Charles Darwin sharply criticized speculation that species could suddenly arise, thereby leaving no fossil trail. Those who claim God had a hand in any of this are ridiculed even more than the cryptozoologists.
With as many as 10 million undiscovered insect species alone, science needs fewer cryptozoologists and more traditional naturalists. The ongoing destruction ...