Oddly enough, Othniel Charles Marsh formally described both Apatosaurus ajax and later the Brontosaurus excelsus, so the guy who named it erroneously still named it correctly, earlier. Camarasaurus supremus was formally described by Marsh’s main rival, Edward Drinker Cope. Camarasaurus is considered a likely antecessor to the Titanosaurs and Brachiosaurs, while Apatosaurus represents the separate branch of sauropods known as the Diplodocids. Thus, that head was a bit of a major goof, in terms of cladistics.

Frankly, the Brontosaurus affair points out the opposite of the dogma Shumway usually likes to accuse science of, because it shows that science IS self-correcting. In this case, more bones were found that were identified as being from a Brontosaurus, but this time with a head. Head identified from previously recovered remains as being an Apatosaurus. Ergo, Brontosaurus are Apatosaurus, and the man who first discovered one gets to name it, therefore Brontosaurus is out, and Apatosaurus is in (Shame though, as Brontosaurus is a much more evocative name).

What annoys (And frankly frightens) a lot of people about science (And I am not insinuating anything on Shumway’s part here, just speaking in general) is that ultimately all it ever says on any matter is, “Here, this is our best guess based on the information available. Give us more information, and maybe we’ll be able to refine that guess, on rare occasions even overturn it.”

Don’t get me wrong, dogma does occur. I’m not sure there’s a CZ enthusiast out there who wouldn’t be willing to admit that. But, just like any other form of dogma, it crumbles under the weight of evidence against it. What makes science different from religion is that there are always some scientists are looking for that evidence. Even more, there are always scientists finding such evidence, whether they are looking for it or not.

As I’ve said before, science is a human endeavour, and like all things human, it is therefore subject to all the flaws and errors to which humanity is susceptible to. The concept of science takes this into account, but scientists, being human, don’t always do so as well.

The difficult thing for your average layman to do, however, is be able to tell when science is on very solid ground and when it is skating on thin ice (Due to human error/bias or a lack of establishable facts) and, further, to not assume that because some tiny bit of minutiae may be wrong, that the whole mountain of evidence on which it rests must be wrong too. By way of example, Bornean clouded leopards may not be a separate sub-species, but that doesn’t change the fact that leopards exist in Borneo, or that they are predators, or that they are mammals.