[meteorite-list] Re: who does what for what cause?

From: joseph_town_at_att.net <joseph_town_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri Jun 17 22:27:12 2005
Message-ID: <061820050227.4047.42B3867400087D9400000FCF21602807480299019BA1089F0A9C0106_at_att.net>

Ok Darren. So you stub your toe on a crystal skull with a pristine meteorite, at least it looks like one, visible inside. You then notice the bones of what looks like a very large hominid, 9 ft. tall, wearing a Conquistador helmet and holding a Viking battle-axe, forget that you're not sure it's a Viking battle-axe, lets just say you know. This all takes place on an Indian reservation in New Mexico. How would you proceed?

Bill


 -------------- Original message ----------------------
From: Darren Garrison <cynapse_at_charter.net>
> On Fri, 17 Jun 2005 19:28:05 -0400, "MarkF" <mafer_at_imagineopals.com> wrote:
>
> >Then in the 90's, the trials repete themselves with a flair.
> >The Larson's are attacked by a fairly well known university, under the
> >skirts of the FBI and Federal prosecutors, and charges of theft of materials
> >from government lands and all the hoopla that goes on with it.
> >Well, to make a long story short. Larson wasn't convicted of theft, nor of
> >cheating a Native American, nor of anything else that would have legally
> >kept Sue, the T. Rex from his possesion. But, because the FBI could somehow
> >prove that some years before Sue was even found, he had left the US with
> >over $10k that he didn't declare, they could keep the fossil and "auction"
> >it off to the highest bidder. Larson got 18 months.
> >Was that justice? Was that the "right" thing to do?
>
> I've read a few books on the Sue debacle (and followed events at the time) and
> in that particular
> case, I believe that the Black Hills Institute was both qualified to correctly
> prep and preserve Sue
> and should have been allowed to retain possesion and build a museum around Sue
> as was their dream.
> I've never been to the BHI personally, but I'm willing to trust Bob Bakker's
> opinion on who is
> capable of caring for a T. rex and he concidered their equipment and their
> talent to be fully good
> enough to care for and study Sue. However, in THIS case, I'm being disgusted by
> someone blatantly
> doing exactly what the FBI accused Peter Larson of-- attempting to sell a rare
> and important fossil
> to anyone who is willing to pay the most for it. And who sneers at the idea of
> anyone who is
> pinko-commie enough not to eat that up with a spoon.
>
> >I think people have to understand that museums are not always the pristine
> >center of learning and study they are made out to be.
>
> I suppose that I could have spoken better in that I don't necessarily think that
> something rare must
> be a display specimen, but that it should be available for study.
>
> With meteorites the situation is much different than with fossils.
>
> Let's say that you find some deeply rare meteorite type-- say, for example, you
> find a new
> chassignite, and one that is slightly different than the original. Lying there
> on the ground, it
> has a scientific value. You pick it up and take it home, it still has
> essentially the same
> scientific value. You cut it up, send away part for classification and study,
> keep part, and sell
> the rest to collectors and interested institutions. It still has essentially
> the same value. With
> modern tools, the research can still be done with just pieces of the whole, and
> very little
> knowledge has been lost by selling pieces to collectors.
>
> But with a fossil, while it is lying in place, it has a certain scientific
> value. You pick it up
> and take it home, and you have destroyed a great deal of the value you would
> have had by studying
> the context, position, surroundings, etc. You very much lose information by
> removing something from
> situ. And if you cut it up, you are also very much losing information. So you
> can't cut a fossil
> (such as a fossil egg) into lots of pieces, send a few to study, keep a few
> fragments, and sell the
> rest to collectors without destroying the scientific value of the piece. It's
> all or nothing--
> either it goes to science and is available to increase our knowledge of the
> history of life on
> Earth, or it goes on the shelf in some rich guy's house.
>
> Think about if that hypothetical different cassignite was treated the same way--
> the entire thing
> going into a single private collection and none at all going into reseach (never
> mind how you would
> know what it is in that situation). Would you not concider that to be a big
> problem? Would you not
> concider that to be a massive crime against science?
>
> I'm not against private ownership of fossils or meteorites. I'm not against
> people making a living
> selling fossils or meteorites. I own fossils and meteorites. But the fossils
> and meteorites I own
> are stuff that, if I offered them to a museum, the curator would pull out a
> drawer full of better
> examples and laugh at me. No science is being lost by my chunks of desert
> chondrites,
> Flexicalymenes, and Scaphites. But if something so rare that the selling of the
> fossil/meteorite in
> question entirely denies scientists access to what could be learned from that
> fossil or meteorite, I
> think that is ethically wrong and should (possibly, but I'm not too decided on
> this point) be
> illegal. Give the finder a fair finder's fee, yes, but don't let him sell it to
> any ass with a wad
> of cash.
>
> A pterosaur egg-- one of less 5 known to exist anywhere, and the only one to
> ever be found in North
> America, wouldn't even be in a grey area-- it would be smack-dab in the middle
> of the "red zone"
> with klaxxons blaring that this should go to formal study, not the auction
> block. And anyone who
> thinks that's it's a-okay and peachy-keen capatilistic to sell something utterly
> rare and important
> to the highest bidder is no scientist and no lover of science.
>
> But given the unlikelyness that two seperate people were attempting to sell two
> seperate objects
> supposed to be pterosaur eggs this past week, with one having a piece of
> sandstone and the other one
> having a pterosaur egg, I have to assume (since he refuses to answer any points
> about the "egg"
> itself and instead just gives snide, sarcastic jabs showing his true character)
> that his "egg" is,
> indeed, the same "egg" identified as a piece of sandstone. If that is the case,
> then I hope he does
> manage to find a buyer. And I hope the buyer finds out that it is a piece of
> sandstone and sues his
> rear and he has to use some of that prepaid legal service he's peddling.
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Received on Fri 17 Jun 2005 10:27:02 PM PDT