Ask Slashdot: How Do I Explain That Humans Didn't Ride Dinosaurs? 278
p00kiethebear writes "I have a wonderful and beautiful girlfriend who treats me right in every way. We've been together for almost a year now and everything seemed to be going perfectly until this morning. Over breakfast we were discussing dinosaurs and she told me a story about how her grandfather, fifty years ago, dated footprints of a dinosaurs and a man that were right next to each other to be within the same epoch of history. I laughed when she said this and then realized that she wasn't joking. She believes dinosaurs and humans walked at the same time together. The odd thing is that she's not religious, it's just what her archaeologist grandfather taught her. More important than just backing up evidence to the contrary, how do I explain this to her without crushing her childhood dreams? Is it even worth discussing it further with her?"
Nooooooo! Just shut up and buy a dinosaur saddle! (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, I'm serious. Really this is one of the fundamental flaws in geeks. Do not fuck up a relationship making your girlfriend feel bad over something that happened 165 million years ago. I know the geek think is: "This is a gateway problem that leads to the entirety of all mystical belief and ruins the world." Shitcan that garbage, now!
A person's religion is rarely entirely from the church, it's a blend things they've heard and want to believe and things their parents believed in addition to church input. Don't treat this any differently than arguing against any other "invisible man in the sky who rights all wrongs and gives us eternal life for being nice people and giving money to the church" belief system.
Let it go. If (and only if) she asks for your help, take her to some museums and do research *with* her and let the overwhelming body of scientific evidence change her mind, not the guy who wants to take her shirt off. If science is not at risk of losing that capability.
You have been warned!
Sigh (Score:4, Insightful)
Why do I even bother to come to Slashdot on April first?
Sad (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Enough is enough (Score:4, Insightful)
Take her on a field trip! (Score:5, Insightful)
She's got to be talking about Paluxy.
http://paleo.cc/paluxy/tsite.htm [paleo.cc]
You need to recognize that your own knowledge of the past is at least as bad as hers (if you didn't already know about Paluxy) so that you won't come across to her as some kind of paternally condescending authority figure. That's bad for your love life!
And you know, if her grandfather was involved in the discovery or documentation of Paluxy, that's awesome and you should celebrate that. Take her to the site! The two of you can look at the actual real life data personally and come to some sort of conclusion together. That would be a lot less stupid than fostering discord because "my authority figures contradict your authority figures" which is what you are looking at doing right now. Have you seen the tracks? I think not, so her opinion (which was possibly passed from a person who actually saw them) is at least as valid as your hearsay beliefs.
Most likely, when you both visit the site, you will find that one or the other explanation is more likely, and you'll both benefit regardless of who is right. Real Science is Fun.
Re:Sorry. (Score:4, Insightful)
How old was the grandfather? (Score:4, Insightful)
He might have first-hand knowledge.
easy (Score:4, Insightful)
"The odd thing is that she's not religious, it's just what her archaeologist grandfather taught her." ...so it sounds like she's just repeating what she was told as a child.. not the church or religion. I don't see a problem correcting someone who was misinformed.
"crushing her childhood dreams" ...just tell her she mis-remembered (she was a kid afterall). It wasn't dinosaurs.. it was another (now-extinct) animal that actually did exist the at the same time as ancient humans (we hunted them, so of course there were footprints)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woolly_mammoth [wikipedia.org]
The woolly mammoth coexisted with early humans, who used its bones and tusks for making art, tools, and dwellings. It is thought much of this material was scavenged, but the species was also hunted for food. It disappeared from its mainland range at the end of the Pleistocene 10,000 years ago, most likely through a combination of climate change, consequent disappearance of its habitat, and hunting by humans, though the significance of these factors is disputed.
or just point her at this: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/paluxy.html [talkorigins.org] (beware: it does mention creationism... you don't want to accuse her of being that)... basically it says the "mantracks" are actually those of a 3-toed dino, but the toe part eroded leaving what looks like feet.
whatever you, make sure you block this at your proxy http://creationmuseum.org/ [creationmuseum.org]
Re:Nooooooo! Just shut up and buy a dinosaur saddl (Score:4, Insightful)
This is the essentially the right answer. Your girlfriend is going to be wrong about a lot of things, because each of us is wrong about a lot of things. Many of them will are so incredibly inconsequential and irrelevant that it's not worth wasting your breath, and I'd suggest this is one of them. Because really, in the entire scope of things, facts about dinosaurs hardly matter. They won't change your day to day behavior.
Pick your battles. Over the span of your relationship, your girlfriend will be wrong about a lot of things, and so will you. Instead of thinking it's your job to make sure your girlfriend is correct in all her beliefs, you should decide that there are some times when you'll let it go. I'm sure there will be times when she's convinced that you're wrong, and you wish she'd just let it go. And believe it or not, sometimes it might be worth backing her up even when she's wrong, just because you have her back.
(I don't mean "you have her back" in a dirty way, though there's that too.)