Update: Mystery Animal Found in India
Posted by: Craig Woolheater on July 4th, 2007
Here’s an update on this story that was originally posted here at Cryptomundo.
Bone riddle may not be solved soon
KOLKATA: The mystery of the bones of an unknown animal unearthed in the Sunderbans may not be unravelled for some time to come. Although forest department officials claim that the bones are on their way to the laboratory of the Zoological Survey of India, the officials of the latter are in the dark about any such development.
Principal chief conservator of forests Atanu Raha said: “The remains are being handed over to the Zoological Survey of India. It shouldn’t take them too long to identify the bones.”
Two forest department officials – Canning reserve forest ranger Badal Debnath and deputy ranger Niladri Das – went to Manmathanagar village under Bipradaspur gram panchayat on Monday. They met the farmer, Santosh Mandal, who had unearthed the bones while digging a pond adjacent to his home on May 26. And, he continues to find more bones.
“We found some hooves even on Monday morning. We kept those in a bag along with the teeth. The entire lot was handed over to forest department officials when they came. We are banking on them to find out the animal to which these bones belonged to. This may actually change the way one perceived the evolution of natural history of the Sunderbans,” said Uttam Saha, a schoolteacher, who had taken the initiative to preserve the bones till the experts arrived.
However, the Zoological Survey of India officials said they were not aware of any such incident. ZSI director Ramakrishnan promised to look into the matter.
“There are many reports of such findings from different parts of the state,” said TK Pal, senior zoologist with ZSI’s prehistoric zoology section.
“Finding animal remains is not rare. Some bones were dug up from Barasat in North 24-Parganas last year. District officials were very eager about the findings but nothing conclusive came out of it. I don’t have details of this particular case but we will look into it,” said Pal.
Zoologists use comparative dating to determine the age of excavated bones and other remains. “We also use the C-14 dating system if the situation demands. We will have to look at these samples and then decide on the procedure,” Pal said.
Although the scientists are sceptical about the remains as most of such findings have come to naught, the villagers remain enthusiastic.
“This area was a dense forest around a century ago. Who knows what lies buried deep. Scientists should probe into the matter with an open mind and reveal the truth,” said Mukut Biswas, the homoeopath in the village, who took the lead in calling up the experts.Times News Network, India
Co-founder of Cryptomundo in 2005.
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Oh, that’s great, Carbon-14 dating, that was shown to be wildly inaccurate by Kansas University, a carbon-14 isotope will completely decay in about 100,000 years.
Nessie-Chaser:
Could you please provide a link about the University of Kansas finding carbon-14 dating to be wildly inaccurate? That sounds interesting.
C-14 is accurate if you choose from among the varying dates you get, the one that fits your theory the best, which appears to be standard practice. The same applies to the other radioactive dating methods.
You know, all these creationist talking points are one of the prime reasons why cryptozoology isn’t taken seriously by the scientific community. Let’s try to reign it in, please.
I’d also like to see this cite for the Kansas U study that found Carbon 14 dating “wildly inaccurate”. I’m not finding it, but I am finding plenty of recent articles about bones discovered by Kansas U students and faculty that are being dated using the Carbon 14 method. Seems a bit odd that a University that completed a study which determined that Carbon 14 dating was “wildly inaccurate” continues to use this very same method to date their bones. Of course, C-14 dating can only be used for samples that are less than a few tens of thousands of years old, or the C-14 will be entirely evaporated. But this is well known to scientists and therefore the method is only used for these types of samples.
So, please, provide a cite for your claims.
Since I’m one of those darned pesky creationists let me add my two cents. From the books I’ve read about C-14 dating (by both evolutionists and creationists) C-14 is pretty accurate back to about 5000 years and then it starts getting a little iffy by adding + or – time to the date.
Perhaps one or our biologists who post here could give us a better understanding of it?
It seems that people’s gripes about carbon-14 dating stem from the misconceptions noted here.
I’d still like to see some citation for the University of Kansas thing, seeing as how they seem to still be teaching about radiocarbon dating and use
radiocarbon dating equipment.
Just a question here: Doesn’t the amount of C-14 and C-12 in an organic object depend on the belief that the world is as it always has been? Wouldn’t higher concentrations of carbon in the past throw off the C-14 content? I have read that trees along a busy highway will actually date far older than they really are due to automobile emissions, for example. Also, tree rings my form twice or more in a year if there are two or more rainy cycles promoting growth. So, isn’t our current dating systems dependent on the idea of uniformity of the enviroment since time began? And isn’t that a bit of a stretch considering current observable upheaval in nature? (volcanoes, forest fires, droughts, floods, etc.) Not trying to argue, but I wonder if there isn’t some room to question such enthusiastic certainty in carbon dating.
Rillo777:
No. If you read the first link that I provided in my last post, you should have many of your questions answered. I also feel the need to point out that there are other factors that age-related data can be checked against to determine the accuracy of the estimated age.
Riley777, that’s actually not correct to my knowledge. I’m not a biologist, but I can tell you from my understanding (and some googling confirmed this) C-14 dating is useful in samples up to about 60 thousand years. Organisms tend to lose all their C-14 at that point, so it’s not reliable past then. The process is almost always checked against other radioisotopes to ensure accuracy in the dating. It also will not work in a few thousand years in the future due to the dawn of the atomic age and nuclear testing in the atmosphere which affects c-14 in lving beings (dead things cease to take on carbon 14, which is primarily the basis for the testing).
Anyway, I’m still not finding this comprehensive test that determined c-14 dating is “wildly inaccurate”, particularly using a scientific method with peer review. The fact of the matter is that creationists don’t often do their own testing, at least not in any serious organized way, spending most of their time trying to disprove evolution or other sciences that contradict the Bible in the hopes that their view will be perceived as the default fall back position. I’ve always found this stance flawed, since even if evolution, radiocarbon dating, etc. were completely proven false, this still offers no evidence for creationism. I understand that many people’s belief systems are completely dependent on something like radiocarbon testing being false so it’s a delicate issue, but this is the accepted dating method of science. It is my view that cryptozoology is struggling to be taken seriously in scientific circles, so using generally accepted practices of science is a must. Personally, I’m just not very concerned whether the churches believe the Loch Ness monster is the Biblical leviathan or that Bigfoots are descendents of nephilim, or whatever else fits the Good Book. Science takes no official stance on religion. It learns and makes predictions by evidence and new knowledge without a foregone end conclusion in place. If the scientific community starts taking cryptozoology more seriously, that’s when the money and serious investigations will start. That’s the day I look forward to. It just seems counter productive to me to seek approval from science while simultaneously debasing what are almost universally accepted methodologies. If that’s not a concern to you, then this won’t matter. But I just don’t think these unknown species have as much chance to be found while cryptozoology is still considered a fringe, at best, science.
Well, hope I didn’t hijack this thread too much, it’s just that I can spot these talking points a mile away, and wanted to try to clarify the scientific position rather than just leave the accusation that C-14 dating is “wildly inaccurate” out there. The links provided by MrAtomicEMonster are good resources, and as he correctly points out, Kansas U is still using and teaching radiocarbon testing so I find it odd that it was cited by Nessie-Chaser as having debunked the process in some study. That’s not to say they didn’t do some study in some department that showed flaws in the method, but the university obviously didn’t put enough stock in said study to discontinue it’s use.
Cheers.
Turk-thanks for the input. While I am a creationist I also believe in the scientific process of evaluating and validating evidence. To me this in no way conflicts with my beliefs. In fact, I would expect such order in a created world. I stand against Christians who do not take the time to study scientific method. They don’t have to agree with the results but they need to know what they are talking about.
As far as cryptozoology goes, scientific method is the only possible route. Hijacking it to “prove” creation is just plain silly. Cryptids prove no particular theory. They exist or they don’t. For example, to me speculating that BF are Nephilim is as fruitless as speculating they are Gigantopithecus. We must find one first before we start arguing over such things.
Rillo777 (sorry, got your name inadvertently wrong in my earlier post–not a morning person), I’d have to disagree with you on some your points here. For one, I’d say this world is exactly consistent with what one would expect in a universe with any design or inherent good and evil. Something on the order of 99%+ of all species to ever exist on the planet are now extinct. To me that hardly points to any kind of deliberate design, much less intelligent or competent design. Not only that, but I think scientific predictions of fossil finds bare out at a very high rate of success. And although science is neutral, as it should be, on the question of religion, that’s not to say that many discoveries and universally held theories are in direct contradiction to the Biblical accounts, at least to the literal interpretation. The theory that the earth orbits the sun, rather than vice versa, was of course rejected out of hand for being in opposition to the Bible. And the list of these diametrical positions has since grown at a substantial rate. The “God of the Gaps” is getting smaller as science rolls on, explaining things previously unknown to human knowledge. Personally, I don’t think science can worry about lining up with religious belief without losing all integrity. It has to be divorced from the consideration of religion. If the evidence it brings to light substantiates something in the Bible, so be it, but if it contradicts it (as often is the case) then said evidence should stand on it’s own merits and be subject to peer review and attempts to disprove it, as good science works. But of course, we are in agreement that the scientific method is the best way we have to test new evidence/theories.
While I understand your point on the hypothetical “nephilim vs. Gigantopithecus” theory, I would have to argue that the thought that bigfoot, assuming they exist, is a Gigantopithecus would be far more useful even before a bigfoot is found. If nothing else, the Gigantopithecus fossils and remains we have can be compared to the evidence of bigfoot, i.e footprints and such, to either rule out the theory or at least keep it in the realm of possibility. And if the proverbial “Holy Grail” arrives some day in the event that a captured bigfoot or body is found, we can compare the two and determine if they are the same homonid, a relative, or no relation at all. The nephilim theory (which I admit, I’ve only seen a few times, so I don’t think there is a big movement advancing this notion even amongst creationists, at least not that I know of) is a non-starter. We have no bones or any other remains of a nephilim, and therefore even a live bigfoot specimen wouldn’t have anything to be compared to in this theory. Unless of course, you take the stance that Gigantopithecus are nephilim, in which case that opens up a whole other can of words and really would get the head spinning.
Like I said, I just broached this subject because there are, I’m sure, many people who come to this site learn things about cryptozoology as well as science, and I didn’t think it fair to just leave the characterization of C-14 testing as “wildly inaccurate” as unchallenged.
I forgot to add that I am very curious to see what this animal may turn out to be, provided it is not a hoax or mix up (some of the details such as the ZSI not being aware the remains were handed over to them is odd). If I recall correctly, the previous post on this before the update, seemed to claim something fairly long and wide and now I notice they mention hoofs. Certainly leaves the identity open to conjecture with those sparse details.
I am what one calls a “creationist”. I am a Christian, but that does not stop me from being interested in certain things. I for one am not interested in Bigfoot or Dinosaurs. They simply do not interest me and my opinion on them does not matter at this point. I am however interested in the Thylacine, and that is how I stumbled across this website. I see that many were discussing radiocarbon dating. I went searching in regards to this upon reading about the Thylacine carcass that was found in 1966, and a zoologist and radiocarbon dating had two different opinions on the age of the body, even though most everything was intact, including the eyes, tongue, stripes clearly visible, and even the whiskers. Radicarbon dating is very flawed in many aspects.
“The shells of living mollusks have been dated using the carbon 14 method, only to find that the method gave it a date as having been dead for 23,000 years!(Science vol. 141 1963 pg. 634-637)”
“A lake Bonney seal known to have died only a few weeks before was carbon dated. The results stated that the seal had died between 515 and 715 years ago. (Antarctic Journal, Washington)”
“Shells from living snails were dated using the Carbon 14 method. The results stated that the snails had died 27,000 years ago. (Science vol. 224 1984 pg. 58-61)”
There are many more examples of these things, and many more websites stating the very apparent flaws in radiocarbon dating. My stance on that particular carcass was the same as Athol Douglas. In my eyes, opinions are more reliable based on the condition of the remains rather than this radiocarbon dating which has produced so many results that are varying that it is impossible to tell. If the shell of a living being is said to have died 27,000 years ago, then that is proof enough that radiocarbon dating is very flawed.
http://www.angelfire.com/mi/dinosaurs/carbondating.html