I notice he admits to using a "consistent biblical model of interpretation". Interpreting the scientific data based on the very limited spectrum of a questionably-edited and-translated, several-thousand-year-old holy book does not hold fast to the scientific method, and thus cannot be called science, or even logic.

All he is doing – like all "creation scientists" – is bending the facts, coupled with a poor understanding of the mindset of an evolutionist.

When he refers to the "last ice age", I assume he means the quaternary glaciation, also known as the Pleistocene glaciation.

This started about 2.58 million years ago and continues to the present day. An ice age is a period of long-term reduction in global temperature, resulting in the formation of ice sheets; for instance, the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica.

Of course, some erosion has taken place over the last 2.58 million years, but as I am unsure of the context of Mr Wright's argument, I shall say no more.

Or perhaps he was referring to the last glacial period (110,000-15,000 years before present). This centred on ice sheets in Eurasia and North America. To say that no erosion took place here is irrelevant, as there were still large areas of untouched surface where said erosion could happen.

I wonder what Mr Wright means when he refers to "inconsistent dating methods". Is he referring to the fully debunked creationist ideas wheeled out at every juncture to deny the veracity of radiocarbon dating? Again, I am unsure.

The fact that Mary Schweitzer's "boss instructed her to disprove" her findings concerning the bones of a T-Rex in 1990 does not surprise me. The thing is, one cannot be sure of something in science until it has been subjected to rigorous tests and attempts to disprove findings.
This, incidentally, is how the theory of evolution has stood the test of 150 years since Darwin published The Origin of Species. It has nothing to do with "distorting scientific fact". It is quite the opposite!

Materpiscis attenboroughi is indeed the oldest known vertebrate to display evidence of giving birth to live young (vivapary); this does not mean it is any younger that 380 million years.

The umbilical cord in question is mineralised. I fail to see how this is "hilarious".

Now, onto the "one bone wonders". I shall deal with them all in turn. First, Piltdown Man. Probably the most famous archaeological hoax in history, a skull was collected from a gravel pit in 1912 and paraded as a 'missing link' in evolution. In 1953, it was exposed as a forgery, simply as three distinct species' skull parts put together.

What is interesting about Piltdown Man is that a man named Franz Weidenreich also realised it was fake in 1923, but it took 30 years for the scientific community to concede this fact. This is in an era without DNA testing etc, before Watson and Crick. As far as I am aware, no reconstruction was, or could, be made from just a fake skull. Any pictures that came about were solely artist's impressions.

The same for Nebraska Man. The tooth, mistakenly identified as that of a hominid, gave rise to an artist's impression of what the hominid might have looked like (in 1922). The drawing was derided as "obviously inaccurate" at the time, and was found to belong to an extinct pig in 1925 (Prosthennops). Tidily debunked, yet it is wheeled out again and again by creationists.

Finally, 'Lucy'. The skeleton of Australopithecus afarensis is indeed only 40 per cent complete, but due to what has been found (thighbone, half a pelvis, arms, etc) we can construct a close replica of what Lucy would have looked like. Also, there have been further discoveries of A. afarensis during the 1970s, showing sexual dimorphism and the like.

Even if 'Rationalist' has "shot himself in the foot", as Mr Wright so colourfully put it, by quoting incorrect statistics, this does not mean it is "painful" being an evolutionist. It must surely be harder to be a creationist, desperately trying to find ways to corrupt science to serve religious ideas. It is deceptive and monstrous. On behalf of evolutionists everywhere, I ask readers not to be taken in by Mr Wright's foolishness and realise that the mass of evidence for evolution defeats any attempt to put the variety of life down to an invisible, inaudible, immaterial God.

I would also like to finish by saying that if "Evolutionists' theories collapse under scrutiny", as the headline states, Mr Wright would receive a Nobel Prize for disproving one of the most concrete scientific theories ever put forward. I shall keep my eye on the news.

Richard Nicholl,
Portstewart