This is late. I am having lots of health issues, so occasionally off, and I didn’t see your not.
I know personally, John Morris, Steve Austin and have met Kurt Wise I think it was breakfast at the 1986 ICC in Pittsburgh. , it has been a long long time since we corresponded. This is going to get me introuble probably, but here is what I know about John Morris’s ‘geological’ degree. I wrote this back int he 1990s.
Yes, he got a valid Ph. D. just not in geology. Remember Joe, I spent 2.5 years in charge of recruiting. I know what a geology M.s. and Ph.D. is.
1.On the Radio Show Science, Scripture and Salvation, on July 10, 1994, John Morris claimed to have a PH. D. in Geology. KCBI Radio Station, Dallas, Texas.
8-7-1994 Science Scripture and Salvation
John Morris said, ““As a geologist who studies…”” dinosaurs. KCBI““In the fall of 1975 I enrolled at the University of Oklahoma in the Geological Engineering graduate program, obtaining the M.S. degree in 1977 and the Ph.D. in 1980, specializing in coal utilization and the mechanics of rock folding and fracturing.”” ~ John Morris, ““For Such a Time as This-ICR and the Future-””, Back to Genesis, 87, p. c
This is a funny claim, rock folding and faulting? Bull. But here are the facts. He got degrees in 'Geological Engineering"" which is what Oklahoma Univeristy calls a petroleum engineering degree. This is not geology. I looked up his thesis and dissertation.
His Masters Thesis was entitled ""Tidal Power State of the Art -1977
His Ph.D. was entitled, ““Development and properties of a self-bursting Pellet as Agglomerated from Coal Fines by Use of an Organic Binder,”” 1980
His Ph.D. dissertation includes only one legitimate geological reference ""S. A. Friedman, ““Investigation of the Coal reserves in the Ozarks Section of Oklahoma and their Potential Uses,”” Oklahoma Geologic Survey, Special Publication 74-2, 1977.
His Masters Thesis also includes only one legitimate geological reference. D.J.P. Swift and A. K. Lyall, ““Origin of the Bay of Fundy,”” Marine Geology, 1968, 6, pp 331-343.
All other references are to engineering and mathematical texts.
John told me at the ICC in 1986, publically and it is on tape, that he had worked in the oil industry. Also bull.
In 1979-1981, as a young man around 30 years old, I was “Mgr of Geophysical Recruiting” for Atlantic Richfield Co., ARCO. Being a creationist and having the goal of hiring 10% of the geophysical graduates in the US, I decided to go out to Christian Heritage College as they had a geophysics degree, taught by Tom Barnes and Harold Slusher. Shell was the only other company that recruted there. It was then in 1979 I met Steve, a newly minted PH D. who had been publishing under the name of Stuart Nevins so that he wouldn’t be kicked out of grad school at Penn State (if I recall correctly). Anyway, I just so happened to be in his office when he got the call from the school, who had just learned of his Stuart Nevins connection and they threatened to pull his degree. I did and still think such a threat is discriminatory. YECs have a right to get an education if they can do the work.
That shook Steve and that afternoon and evening at the dinner we held for the professors (a whole story unto itself). I need to tell this too. On this trip I was ushered into Henry Morris’ office met him and I got to tell him that I had gone over and reproduced Jody Dillow’s calculations of the earth temperature under a 40 ft vapor canopy. I told him Jody had made a mathematical error. Henry said, “The math is out there for everyone to see.” rejecting my statement. I went over the mistake, Henry said the same thing, and I finally said, 'How many idiots like me do you think there are who will actually go over all hat math?, He made an error". Henry repeated his mantra. I was ushered out. At the dinner I met Gish also, sat next to him. We had a nice time. On the other side of me was Steve.
Steve and I discussed some of the hard issues geological data presented to the YEC view–shoot, just the mere thickness of the sedimentary layer (60,000 feet) was a problem. We did specifically discuss the fact that radioisotopes are essentially gone after 10 half-lives and we discussed the fact that at that time no isotope which had a half life shorter than 450 myr was found on earth unless it was part of a process of decay chain or being made in some other currently active process. Several years later when I mentioned in the literature that he had agreed with me on this, he denied it in the literature. But I know what we talked about that night. Steve knows, but by being Stuart Nevins, he cut himself off from any other geological job. That isn’t fair, but it is the truth. He paid a high price for his belief but I know he knows the problems.
Kurt’s entire mission was to try to solve some of the issues of geology in a better way. So Kurt knows as well.
One guy shell hired from Christian Heritage that year was so disturbed by what he saw he quit the industry and went into a real tailspin. Another CHC guy shell hired eventually left the faith. I hired one good guy from CHC who has become a life long friend. When he decided the earth was old, I asked him if there was anything geological that he was taught by the ICR gang that he still believed to be true. He said no. So I called all the CHC grads in the oil industry at the time and asked them all. the answers were all ‘no’. My friend still doesn’t believe in evolution, but he knows the world is old. Same with Steve Robertson who was author of the first (I think) ICR monograph on the Poyting Robertson effect. He dated Henry Morris’s daughter for a while and was very serious about her. They didn’t marry.
I had a YEC geologist I worked with. He and I were friends. This was after I had become an old earth evolutionist. He knew the problems and everytime I would throw a new issue at him, he would laugh and say “I will put it in my bucket”, and I would reply that is one mighty heavy bucket, and he would slump one shoulder. He felt he had to be a YEC for theological reasons. But he didn’t deny the data was not in favor of his position.